Recent Imperial History

It took twelve long years of negotiation, betrayal, renegotiation, assassination, and debate but the Inner Council (with several replacement Councilmen) finally came to a decision on the matter of leadership. It was proclaimed by the Imperial Inner Council on the Feast of the Emeperor 376, that the rightful ruler was Emilio Dante of House Zadrouin, nephew to Corvass Zardouin, Emperor Medaka IV. It was felt by the Inner Council that Corvass’ triumph over the other Council members in 355, his honourable adoption of the name of the first Emperor as his own and his knowledge of magical arts granted the line of Zadrouin the strongest ties to the throne. As the eldest male relative to Medaka IV, Emilio was the clear choice. He was crowned two days later as Emperor Dante I.

The increased presence of Confederate Longships in the Northam Sea and East Hurn Sea troubled Emeperor Dante, but he was more concerned with internal matters than with rekindling the war with the Confederacy. He did his best to improve his naval forces in those areas and strengthen the coastal towns’ defences, but his main efforts went to continuing the work of Sidram III; repopulation and economiztion.

With almost nothing to do but protect imperial citizens from other, less socially satisfied imperial citizens, the Imperial Army began suffering a morale problem. While it is well known that a good war with a foreign power does wonders to lift the spirits of the fighting men, civil war has quite the opposite effect. The abundance of riots, and rebellions the Army was called upon to crush caused some soldiers to re-examine their lives, and many of them found they were not happy. They began deserting the glory of live in the Imperial Army for the glamour of being outlaws and renegades. It wasn’t until 380 that the Army admitted that there was a desertion problem. Up to that point the punishment for desertion had been execution. Not necessary a permanent sentence. A new law was passed in 380 stating that those found guilty of desertion would be sentenced to hard slave labour. And, if such labour was to prove prematurely fatal, the guilty would be hunted down and sentenced to another life of slavery. And so on and so on.

In the Spring of 383, a band of renagade soldiers, using obfuscation and trickery took the fortress town of Battlekeep, on the Eastern side of the Rockland Mts. (but still officially Imperial territory). Emeperor Dante boarded the Perinthal Gydens, the flagship of the Imperial Navy, along with 250 members of the elite Imperial Guard, to personally oversee the reclamation of Battlekeep. The battle was a success for the Imperial Guard, but on the last day of the fight a freak storm blew out of the South Sea and the Perinthal Gydens was sunk. All hands, including Emeperor Dande were lost at sea. None of them were successfully resurrected.

Once again, the Empire had no Emperor. In the weeks that followed the ship-wreck, three members of the Inner Council and fifteen members of the Imperial Senate, who each held some claim to the newly vacated throne, were assassinated in such a manner that made their resurrection impossible. The Imperial Senate was in a state of chaos; for the first time in as long as any of them could remember nobody wanted to lay claim to the crown! The fear of permanent death kept all contenders, even those with legitimate claims silent. The Inner Council was filled and the Senate likewise restocked but no one dared sit on the throne. For the next seven years each member of the Inner Council spent their share of time as Acting Emperor, as they waited for the return of Emperor Dante, or for whoever had the other Senators removed, to come and claim the throne. Towards the end of 390, Council Lady Lavina Cortenne was elected by the Inner Council to become Provincial Empress. She was intended to be nothing more than a figure head for the Empire, someone the people could look to and say ‘That is our leader’ not some vague and nebulous body called the Inner Council. Provincial Empress Lavina enjoyed being head of state and in the year of Our Emperor 394 she went against the rule of the Inner Council and declared herself Her Grand Majesty Empress Levina and claimed all the power of the Empire for her own. The Inner Council was very briefly outraged, and then they were very swiftly eliminated. The Empress Levina filled the Inner Council with women, which outraged the Senate, but there was little they could do about it. The people had become used to their Empress’ flights of fancy and were, for the most part quite happy with her.

It was not until 396 (what Lavina declared the Year of the Woman) that her eccentricities went too far. First she decreed it illegal for men to own property, then two weeks later, she declared that being anything other than female was a crime, the punishment for which was being given as a slave to the nearest woman who would have you. It was at this point that the Empire decided that it had had enough of the insane Empress Lavina. She and her closest advisors were removed from the Palace by force by the Order of the Talon. She and her crones put up a strong fight, but in the end they were all dead or in prison.

Her son, Zuffrin Laborre Cortenne would have become the next Emperor but the new Inner Council feared that Lavina’s madness may have been passed down on to her son. The Council was once again tasked with finding a new Emperor. In the Summer of 397 a search went out across the Empire for any fit man, woman or child who could legitimately trace their lineage to the House Zadrouin, House Vargas or House Sidram. Many answered the call an they were all closely scrutinized. For years ruler after ruler was crowned and reigned for a time, only to be denounced as a fraud or replaced by someone with a stronger claim to royal lineage. Many of the frauds were executed but some just faded quietly away.

Finally, in the year of Our Emperor 404 a man-child came forth from a village in the Province of Gallinule, near the Southern Forest. He was fourteen, an orphan, and had in his possession an amulet which, he claimed had been passed down from generation to generation in his family since the days of the Pentavrate States; since the time it had belonged to Prince Daliel Medaka, younger brother of Tobias Medaka, the Founder of the Empire itself. His claim was exhaustively researched by scholars and a ritual was invented to determine the veracity of the orphan’s tale. The magic proved that he amulet had belonged to Daniel Medaka. His tale as at least partially true, and after four years without any disputing evidence, the young man was crowned a the True Emperor, Medaka V, on the Emperor’s Feast, in the year of Our Emperor 407.