The Archmage
Centuries ago, the Realm fractured into nations and stood on the brink of civil war. The One-Eyed King was poised to reconquer the world, kind of looking forward to it, truth be told. It’d been a long time since the flesh machines and war ghosts got a real outing. The Archmage stepped in to broker a compromise: the Federation, a body of sovereign civilised states.
The Federated Nations and Cities were mostly split on language and racial lines. The Federation was mostly dominated by the King’s land of Omen, apart from the elves in the North, but it sufficed for a time. The Archmage’s power and guidance held things together, until it didn’t.
The Archmage’s overriding goal is to stop the war and restore peace, but he’s busy with terrible arcane secrets - or, some say, dying. They also say that his Apprentice backs the Conqueror, and that the two wizards intrigue against each other, and you never know which one you’re really working for.
Relationships: It’s thanks to the Archmage that the Diabolist is not a greater threat. He’s a man of peace, viewing the Orc Lord, the Conqueror, the Demigod and the Fisher as all the same: threats to society, harbingers of calamity. While disclaiming the rigours of Election, the Archmage does support the gods of light. Some accuse him of getting along a little too well with the One-Eyed King, and sharing magical secrets…
The Conqueror
The master of the Dragon Empire has an official biography. His childhood idyll; his tragic past; his rise to local prominence in a world where human rights meant nothing if agents of Omen gainsaid them; his struggles against corruption and the founding of Axis.
People tend to skip those chapters and get to the bit where the bronze dragonriders razed Wyldfort. The Conqueror has captured half the old Federation and means to unify the whole world - liberating it from the One-Eyed necromancer king. He’s backed by the Elect among the Gods of Light, the Five Dragons, the Dwarf King’s army of vengeance and sheer righteousness.
Relationships: The Conqueror is allied with the Dwarf King and with the Five; obviously, not a fan of the Wizard King. They don’t speak. They don’t invite each other to parties. The Dragon Emperor also supports the Elector and his peculiar religious theosophy; anything that binds his new land tighter without the arcane coercion of the enemy tyrant.
The Demigod
The Demigod is said to be heir to the One-Eyed King and born champion of the dark gods. The demigod’s visored, fanatic forces could be a great threat to Axis - or to Omen itself - but the Demigod is busy. The Demigod is covered in all these fucking orcs.
Even the Conqueror and the Archmage tacitly support the Demigod’s mission: to destroy the orcish plague and exterminate their Lord. Most people are at least relieved that someone is dealing with the threat from the North, and further relieved that the Demigod’s holy war doesn’t intersect with the secular chaos of the Conquest. Yet.
Relationships: The Demigod is tolerated by many, but calls only the Prince of Shadows a friend. His great enemies are the forces of chaos: the Orc Lord and the Diabolist, who would ravage civilisation and leave nothing in its wake. He wants an eternal dark empire, not a void.
The Diabolist
There have always been Diabolists. Unwise and whimsical, mostly powerful women who deal with demons and pain. The thing about demons? They’re bad, but they’re rare. The Diabolist is in fact particularly problematic for summoning demons at all. Most people don’t do that. Why would you do that? There’s no such thing as an Abyss or split in the world. The Conquest is quite enough war for anyone without bringing demons into it.
The Diabolist’s schemes are dangerous, but compared to the major conflict, almost.. zany. Tales of her exploits are light entertainment for soldiers who have to fight skeletons every day. That’s not to say that adventurers known to work for the Diabolist wouldn’t be seen as villains, but it’s probably forgivable as a kind of b-plot cackling lunatic villainy, not comparable to the real and ancient tyranny of the One-Eyed King.
Relationships: For some reason, the Diabolist cultivates an acquaintance with the Elf Queen - her burbling emissaries are among the few admitted to the Court. Elven woods are given immunity from demonic attacks. Presumably this is part of some terrible scheme? She’s long been tolerated by the One-Eyed King, as a distraction from his own evil, but is otherwise pretty much poison.
The Dwarf King
The Throne Beneath the Mountain is broken and defiled. Black elves’ blood has stained it and the creatures of the deep have taken the dwarves mines and homes for their lairs. The deep roads are warrens, and only the colony at Forge, won in fire from the dead Elf King, remains.
The Dwarf King will have further vengeance.
Relationships: The dwarves, the dragons and the humans have a three-fold alliance, to destroy and remake the world. They’re joined by loose coalitions of other races - even elves - but in particular, the Dwarf King owes the survival of his people to the Conqueror, and will never betray him. The new Elf Queen? He’s got no opinion. The Diabolist, the Orc, the Prince? War criminals to be put to the mallet. In different times, the dwarves would have been sympathetic to the ideas of the Fisher. As it is, they have little time for reform.
The Elector
The Gods are great. But some of them are greater than others. The Elector of the Churches of Light determines who among gods is worthy of worship by men. These are Gods of Light, so the losers aren’t that sore.. usually. In some communities, the Elector’s pronouncements are the best way to start a riot.
The congregations of the Elect have a great deal of power in the Dragon Empire; going hand in hand with the liberation of the necropolitan lands is a repudiation of their dark gods and terrors. Clerics and miracles are perhaps the Conqueror’s greatest asset apart from the actual dragon riders that give his empire its name. The Elector and his bureaucracy work very hard to select only the best gods for this task, and if a few sensibilities get trampled in the meantime, that’s tough.
Relationships: Although the Elector has no authority inside Omen, his blessings and citations are just as powerful there - and a strong weapon against the dead. The One-Eyed King hates that. The Demigod and the Diabolist are also particularly opposed to the Elector, on grounds of differing faith- but none fight him so actively as the Fisher. She sees the Elect as the worst kind of elitism, divinely wrought upon humanity, and representative of all that’s wrong with the Dragon Empire.
The Elf Queen
The Elf Queen was born in the instant that the Elf King died at the hands of the Dwarf King. There’s a story there, but the new young Queen is known by her own deeds:
- losing her ancient people to civil war, a sundering which can never be truly healed
- unleashing the terror of the Orc Lord on Omen. and whatever else gets in his way
- spending all day in her most isolated room at the Court of Stars, refusing to come out.
Right now the elven race, possibly the preeminent power of the former Federation, is carved into shards and tearing itself apart. If something isn’t done soon, it could be the end of an ancient people.
Relationships: Befriended and possibly entrapped by the Diabolist. Shunned by the races of men and dwarves. Politely snubbed by the Archmage and ignored by the Fisher. It’s complicated with the Orc Lord - extremely complicated. The Elf Queen is technically an ally of the One-Eyed King in Omen, who’s so far delegated the orcish question to the Demigod, but how long can it last?
The Fisher
The ‘Fisher of Men’ to her followers and the ‘Fisherman’s Wife’ to her enemies. Once the princess of Federated Horizon; the city-state was brought low by the Conqueror to wipe out its arcanists (or at least conscript them; agreeing to fight the Wizard King is basically the only way they get to live, after having served him). She fled to the sea, and the sea took her in. This is rumoured to be literal - an inheritance of the murdered Druid’s powers.
The Fisher represents the common people of the Midland, and the sea itself. They don’t care about war between the Conqueror and the King; they care about where their meal is coming from (the ocean provides) and whether there’s a roof over their head (not if a dragon burned it down). Her cadres would rather, in fact, that kings and emperors did not exist.
The anarchists under the Fisher have cells all over, but particularly in the central parts of the realm. Working with them can be lucrative for adventurers and a way to feel good about yourself, but it’s also the one thing that Omen and Axis agree is high treason.
Relationships: The Fisher claims to stand for the little people, and against ‘great’ figures of history. She’s still known to have dealt with the Orc Lord, and supports the Archmage - they both care for the land, rather than its politics.
The Five
Under the benevolent glare of the Gold, the Five Wyrms are the exemplars of dragonkind. Their claws drip power and their scales reflect glory. The Five rule the Federated City of Drakkenhall from the Golden Citadel, but right now they’re mostly engaged in war.
Several are actively supporting the nascent Dragon Empire - honoured in response by its very name. Dragons don’t care about names. They care about the One-Eyed King’s terrible dracolich, which was previously the White…
Relationships: The dragons’ alliance is dubious. The Gold commands entire flights of metallic wyrms, and seems to have the others under its sway - but the Blue expresses a preference for wizards and warriors, the Black deals with demons and dark gods, the Red prefers the bloody clashes of dwarves and orcs. In recent times the Green has made no political dealings at all.
The One-Eyed King
For Ages the King has ruled the world, in name or in practice. His puissance, his necromancy and his ruthless drive kept the Realm in thrall for centuries, though he was eventually forced to cede a measure of independence to the Federated Nations. The King could live with that. The people of Omen thought the King remarkably generous, when the King was listening.
Undead labour is incredibly evil, according to the gods of light - involving as it does the permanent enslavement of spirits, keeping them forever from their rest - but it is extremely convenient. The security and prosperity of the Necropolitan lands was supposed to endure forever, with only total loyalty to the King as its price. Prophets now say the end of the Age has come. Prophets can be dealt with. The orcs, the dragons, the dwarves and the Conqueror are more of a problem.
Relationships: The One-Eyed Wizard King claims the Archmage, the Elf Queen and the Demigod as vassals. None agree, but they haven’t made public breaks either. His kingdom, once an empire, is under siege by everyone else.
The Orc Lord
Born from the guilt of the Elf Queen and the death of the High Druid. Forged in the burning of King’s Wood; hardened against the walls of Concord. The orcs are seen as a plague and a natural disaster, but they’re people. People who really enjoy breaking things. Their leader, whatever his origin, is brilliant and ravenous. Only the Demigod stands between him and the heart of the Realm - and there are more than a few people who’d rather see the horde let through to break Omen.
Why does the Orc Lord seek to tear down walls and burn down industry? Orcs at times seem driven by sheer destruction, but their Lord is different. He has an agenda and a target, and he’s willing to forego random violence, to concentrate on the task at hand. Do you want to be the one to ask him why?
Relationships: The Orc Lord is on good terms with the Five; dragons generally approve of powerfully smashing things, stealing gold, etc. They have enough shared goals that they’ve been known to cooperate - as have the odd orc scout and agents of the Fisher. He’s actively at war with the Demigod and the King, as well as the forces of civilisation more broadly speaking.
The Other
There is another Icon, unknown. There has to be. For all the eleven Ages of the Realm, there have always been the same forces rising and falling. Is the Fisher the heir to the High Druid? Are the Five truly one?
Relationships: If you knew that, it would be half the battle won.
The Prince of Shadows
The trickster who stole the hearts of the gods, the beards of the dwarves and the scales of the wyrms. It’s said he murdered the High Druid and started the war. It’s said he married the Diabolist and tamed her wrath. It’s said he’s a myth, a trick of the King, a whisper of the Fisher. The Prince of Shadows exists, and he writes columns about himself in the newssheets to make sure nobody else gets it wrong.
The Prince was born in Concord/at sea during a pirate raid/in the mind of madness. His title comes from his rightful claim to the old imperial throne, from a gambling victory, or is pure science fiction. Adventurers in his employ are unlikely to avoid excitement.
Relationships: The fact is that most people have bigger problems than jumping at Shadows. They say that the Demigod invites him to his ‘hunting’ lodge and laughs when the Prince jokes about how the dark gods are mere power fantasies. They say that the Conqueror has promised he’ll be the last; that his princedom is secure until the Dragon Empire rules every other scrap of land. They say that the Fisher will give a pearl the size of a watermelon for the Prince’s head.