Nutean Kezen
Nutean Kezen
Religion
Traditions
+25% Rebel Suppression Efficiency
-15% Stability Cost Modifier
Dragon of the North Valley"Dreaded Chaos could not swallow daring hearts\nDaring hearts could not blaze without Order’s influence\nOrder’s influence could not be felt without a conqueror\nA conqueror could not rule without vanquishing all like dragon’s flame”\n\n- Stanza 3, Tallies of the Old Wood and the Rise of Nutean Kezen\n\nA spark lit in our people not long ago. Not content with the dithering, the curious, or the selfish, we looked beyond the succession of spirit-soothing sages and shamans to a tried and true tyrant: Gaximo Narkez. From tumult to fire, she vanquished any and all who dared oppose her vision of a unified valley by 1439, earning her the moniker of Kezen, or “Dragon,” forevermore. In her reign’s twilight, Kezen established a notable rule for all new mage-shaman leaders that would succeed her: to pledge by the Laws of God’s fractured essences that they seek rule over all of Nomsyulhan. This legacy of pleading conquest before ascension, dubbed Kezen’s Oath, became Nutean Kezen’s founding myth and central legend of legitimacy in a sea of capricious mages.
+10% Shock Damage
Lord of All Reality"A conqueror without Order flittered on the wind\nAn Order without a conqueror sifted as sand\nProgeny swore by authority they did not cherish\nElders wept, tumbling down reincarnation’s wheel, vows shirked"\n\n- Stanza 9, Tallies of the Old Wood and the Rise of Nutean Kezen\n\nYei II Bikenkonen, only the third ruler since Kezen’s reign, swore Kezen’s Oath upon his ascent to High Chief in 1473. A boisterous soul, Yei outshined his competition by binding a powerful Word spirit. Before his thirtieth summer, he conquered the last holdouts of Nunsan Banbe, the ascetic Shevhedil and Olkhalsu, and even besieged the reclusive summit of Bazuneizar. But as dragon flame consumed the North Valley, Chaos crept into Yei’s heart. With the great wastes overflowing with spirits, Yei forsook Kezen’s Oath and diverted his attention to his own enlightenment by binding himself to uncountable numbers of spirits. His efforts took years, and as Yei achieved mastery of several Laws and his thousandth spirit, Nutean Kezen withered from within. An ascendant Kuenan Nirokyu, sensing opportunity, outmaneuvered Yei into a war in 1502, and despite his legion of spirit pacts and mastery of Laws, he failed to master Time, succumbing to fever on a desert flat mid-campaign. The resulting fallout saw all of Yei’s work undone as successors bickered and fought, carving out fiefdoms and ending our first great era.
-10% Core-Creation Cost
+0.5 Yearly Devotion
+0.5 Yearly Horde Unity
+0.5 Yearly Legitimacy
+0.15 Yearly Republican Tradition
Warlock Spirit Pacts"Enlightenment without temperance is ambition\nAmbition without purpose is madness\nMadness without thought is Chaos\nChaos must be Ordered, by thought, by purpose, by temperance"\n\n- Stanza 16, Tallies of the Old Wood and the Rise of Nutean Kezen\n\nYei’s debacle wrought shock through Nutean Kezen, marking the divide between our mythical founding and middle pact periods. As our enemies picked through the spoils, the ancient forests of Iona Saothar guarded the weakened nation’s heart, and after a decade of civil war, a new chieftain arose: Iztue Inrazoenen. Iztue began his reign in 1513 by swearing Kezen’s Oath, earning both legitimacy and fear, before unifying the woods just as Kezen did so long ago. Seeing failure in Yei’s actions, Iztue opined that the former High Chief’s fall came from a myriad of spirits and research projects in his bid for personal enlightenment. To not repeat this perceived folly, Iztue forsook the multiple and miniscule, instead gambiting on few but powerful spirits bound in pacts of domination. By 1521, Nutean Kezen had averted defeat and returned as a primary power in Nomsyulhan. Iztue’s view on Laws and spirits affected future mage-shamans in the realm for generations to come.
+1 Land Leader Shock
Dragonnel Roosts"Shape is Time and Space perceived\nThe Shape to fly, to walk, to stand\nLight reveals, yes, but Shape is revelation\nJust as the senses are to sensation"\n\n- Stanz 25, Tallies of the Old Wood and the Rise of Nutean Kezen\n\nPetite kin of the great dragons, dragonnel roosted in the ancient forests since before our great ascent. Seeking to align with our totem’s might, our forebears braved their nests to tame these skyward steeds. After generations of enlightenment-searching chiefs, hobgoblins gracing the sky on dragonnel-back is commonplace; Yet it was only by Kezen’s unification of the verdant that dragonnel riding became a hallmark of Nutean Kezen culture. By nurturing the woods and safeguarding their roosts, we can foster unprecedented numbers of dragonnel to swell our riding ranks. Let us blot the sky with Shapes of flight!
+25% Cavalry to Infantry Ratio
Unodeke Hunting Parties"Chaos hems the pristine Order\nLike unodeke poach dragonnel eggs\nTrim the death-weeds that choke the fields\nTo stasis Shape in Order’s brace"\n\n- Stanza 32, Tallies of the Old Wood and the Rise of Nutean Kezen\n\nWhen we scaled heavensward, we encountered three things: ogres, spirits, and unodeke. Our relationship with both ogres and spirits is in flux just as Order and Chaos tug against one another, but we’ve always kept a constant: to hunt, for safety or glory, these powerful beasts. Even the term is taken from the ogres’ udnorykhet, or strange beasts, to describe the otherworldly and deadly creatures not seen elsewhere in all creation. After our initial exodus fractured and divided into countless shaman rulers, it became common for particularly daring mages to organize and lead hunting parties for martial prestige, and Nutean Kezen was no different. Even Kezen, ruthless conqueror and unifier of the ancient forests, added a treasure trove of unodeken trophies to the countless piles she inherited from her predecessors. By the 16th century, Iona Saothar’s capital halls included dozens of rooms devoted entirely to unodeken keepsakes and tales for current and former shaman hunters.
-1% Prestige Decay
Rule of the Dragon"Order sounds across the bough\nLike dragonnel screeches announcing a hunt\nChaos stirs, a rabbit in its burrow\nScurrying from Order’s talons, just and clean"\n\n- Stanza 44, Tallies of the Old Wood and the Rise of Nutean Kezen\n\nUnder High Chief Iztue Inrazoenen, Nutean Kezen resumed its conquests of Nomsyulhan, starting with Kuenan Nirokyu in 1528. After threatening The’as Aschur on campaign, Iztue secured a favorable treaty in late 1532 and returned home to recuperate for the next campaign. On the eve of Iztue’s grand invasion in the spring of 1539, his mind splintered and his senses faltered. Adrift of leadership, Iztue’s unassuming and silent daughter Vronoki swore Kezen’s Oath and plucked the reins of rule from her addled father. Supported by two pacts with mighty spirits of poison and air, Vronoki highlighted how both foreign and domestic figures had withered the otherwise healthy Iztue. She set about purifying Nutean Kezen from these duplicitous elements, though delirious rebels claimed that Vronoki herself had disposed of Iztue. Styling herself as Kezen reincarnated, her stone-faced wroth and iron will subdued rebellions both mundane and magical through the 1540s and 1550s with spectacular speed and cruelty. For all generations born after, we know the name Vronoki as a symbol of strength, vigilance, and uncompromising efficiency, and even segments of the ancient forests remain tinged red with fire and blood from her grand works.
-1 National Unrest
+0.5 Yearly Absolutism
Chaos Adept Mages"Slivers of fading heat rise from the heights\nThe sun kissing Halann in perpetual Order\nBut even in Order’s design, the waves\nOf Chaos linger with every mirage"\n\n- Stanza 62, Tallies of the Old Wood and the Rise of Nutean Kezen\n\nDespite her notoriety for deploying domestic dragonnel spies and seasonal court purges, Vronoki’s legacy included her particular views of utilizing Laws; by reshaping our training of new spirit mages, we’ve gazed long and hard at our weakest selves. Order directs, yes, just as Kezen swore, and by a dragon’s flame can the whole of sky and earth be righted. But Chaos bends and buckles between the cracks, and our mages learned this well as Vronoki leveled fort and farmstead alike. If we were to fulfill Kezen’s Oath to rule all of Nomsyulhan, we needed to take power by whatever means. Mages both great and small, emboldened by Vronoki’s edict of strength, manipulated Order’s bane to win battle, fame, and power. By her death in 1578, Nutean Kezen’s mages manipulated Chaos in dizzying and dastardly ways unthinkable by other Eagle Hobgoblins. In the High Chieftess’ own words: “How far can Nutean Kezen rise if we do not strain our wings to touch the sky’s ceiling?”
-3% All Power Costs
Ambition
-0.05 Monthly Autonomy Change
History
TBD
Strategy
TBD