~Darkening~
Weep, Mother.
No. The fact that there are no Pirian in Nontin or Norvalin.
LINESII- Into the Darkness- Part II
- Thread starter Lord_Iggy
- Start date
Thlayli
Le Pétit Prince
Well, it might be understandable how Norvalin would resist conversion. They are quite religious, you know.
~Darkening~
Weep, Mother.
Well so are my people, yet they converted.
Kozmos
Jew Detective
When orders be due?
Thlayli
Le Pétit Prince
Friday, but write them NAO so that Iggy can get an early start on the update, since we missed this weekend.
Orders sent!
Orders sent!
TerrisH
Mischief?
already sent mine! And if anyone can guess my Tactics and what I am roughly baseing them upon in world history, points to you! ^_^
Kentharu
Zebra Commander
i hate those new rules!! RAWR FEEL MY RAWTH!! 
anyway, contempt answer my pm bitte
anyway, contempt answer my pm bitte
das
Regeneration In Process
LIggy, dont change any rules yet. Change them after update if you want. Don't seem to be particularily horrible or anything to me.
Moderator Action: Thlayli, alex994, 3 day ban, continued spamming.
I was quite serious when I told y'all to quit spamming.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889
I was quite serious when I told y'all to quit spamming.
Please read the forum rules: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=422889
das
Regeneration In Process
Evil, like good, lacks a true and definite definition; nevertheless, most people, even despite themselves, can often agree that some actions lack redemption - and thus are evil. For all eternity, these evil deeds have been commited all over the universe, all in accordance with some philosophy. Numerous are the atrocities done in the name of utility, in pursuit of pragmatic gain; but countless are those done in the name of good, in the name of justice and for various other such concepts. Yet how many evil deeds were done explicitly in the name of evil? Not even simple sadism or greed, but in the name of pure evil that is above such petty wrongdoings? Undeniably, there were some such deeds, and they all were noteworthy, deeds of diabolical, strong people that dared challenge everything, dared deliberately go against the world (which rejects pure good and pure evil alike). But even then, the philosophy of evil rarely gained prominence, because of its very simple pointlessness. Most people just want to lead a good, safe, hopefully (not necessarily) comfortable life. Most others are fanatics that fight in the name of pure good, and they too can be understood, to a certain extent, as pretty much everyone would acknowledge that not all is right in the world, and that there are plenty of wrongs that perhaps need to be righted or at least corrected. What wrongs exactly is a very debatable issue, but it is less important. As with people, so with rulers - most of them live and work either for pragmatic gain (for themselves and/or for the state) and simple stability, either to "right wrongs" - in this case, introduce reforms, purge the corrupt, lead crusades and wars of revenge. Philosophy of state is thus divided between pragmaticism and dogmaticism; the ultimate personification of the former is a bureaucratic monarchy or a parliamentary republic, of the latter - a totalitarian system of one allegience or another, but, as dogmaticism and fanaticism is usually also done in the name of pure good, the totalitarian system usually is also a "good" one, for all the practical good that does to the imperfect, sinful populace. The philosophy of pure evil has rarely gained power; in fact, until recently, despite the counterexample of the Drengin Empire in the Galciverse, we would have said that pure evil's rise to power is impossible.
But once, acts in the name of pure evil were considered impossible, because of their senselessness. Yet they still happened. And so, if for a brief moment, the LINESIIverse gained the dubious honour of housing a genuinely evil state.
Now, some things must be said about LINESIIverse. As can be easily discerned from its name, it is a NES universe; that is to say, the strangest things may happen there, as it is ruled by a moderator and its nations are controlled by players, all of them, ofcourse, NESers. A curious experiment, it is a "fresh start" NES, but not set on Earth; instead, it is set on a different planet. Far from all of its secrets have been revealed by its moderator, probably to keep the suspense. As of the 13th century, it sat at the end of one war - during which Veritas, a southern theocratic monotheist state otherwise fairly similar to Rome, was thwarted in its bid for domination and its people, the Valins, dispersed across the Eastern Ocean - and the beginning of another, as Lengels - nearly the same as Mongols, but under different influences - poured into the Cradle (main concentration of civilizations) from the north. By then, several greater civilizations had established themselves in the Cradle - not counting Veritas, we must mention the theocratic, sophisticated, unique Shalamari, militaristic, autocratic, Negroid Gorin and the Graeco-Egyptian, philosophical Khemri - these three were the nations that brought down Veritas and, as the Crystal Ridge Alliance, now stood poised to clash with the Lengels. There were lesser countries in the CRA as well - the various periphereal, semi-barbaric nations of the west and the post-Veritasian nations of the east, and lastly, Gerber, an ancient, but weak and backwater nation, notable for its reckless militarism and xenophobia, and constant frustration of great territorial ambitions.
It is there that evil would take hold, ofcourse. Never the best of people in the first place, with their constant defeats and isolation the Gerberians grew ever more bitter. Their wars, initially driven by the logic of lebensraum and expansion, gradually gained an element of vengeance, and after a while Gerber was beginning to simply lash out at all around it, like a mad caged lion. Though Gerber once had a proud oral tradition and sophisticated culture, all that mostly stagnated and died away by now, and foreign influence that might have reinvigorated Gerber's culture was viciously resisted, until recently. The early 13th century saw an apparent thaw, as Gerber entered the CRA and begun inviting foreign specialists for great reforms and building projects. It was being pushed onwards to progress by the man who would later turn it around and push it with even greater force in the different direction; back then, he was known as Toghol-Advisor. The increasingly senile, corrupt and weak kings of the Cecilid bloodline depended on their advisors and courtiers, and they often got the real power in the state; however, they usually were soon displaced by newer favourites and overthrown by conspiracies. Toghol-Advisor displaced all those that stood in his path, and with all his ingenuity and great capacity for intrigue, quashed conspiracies like bugs, eventually growing bored and playing them off against each other intricately.
Just as we have examined Gerber's past for the factors that drove it to evil, so we must examine the past of Toghol-Advisor; alas, little is known of the man who, for a few decades until his death, made pure evil a state philosophy. Alas, we know little of his past, but for Aghol-Chronist's scroll "The Most Evil Man in the World":
It is not a source that might be considered completely reliable; surprisingly enough, despite its title, it is more similar to Togholist propaganda than to anti-Togholist. However, we have no better sources, so this will have to do. We have no knowledge of Trekar-General, but some unofficial Khemri sources do mention an "Ambassador Krar of the Gerbers", who, with an unspecified entourge, arrived in Khadon travelling from Shalamari; as before that, the Gerbers didn't have normal diplomatic relations with Shalamari (ever since the 10th century, when the Shalamari religious aggression caused one of the first known cases of xenophobic reaction in Gerber, back then culminating with the expulsion of all Crystalists (followers of the Shalamari religion)), it would seem that Kurar-Ambassador did play an important role in the diplomacy of the age. In any case, Toghol had from the start been more exposed to foreign cultures than most other Gerberians, and thus gained a far greater knowledge of them - knowledge mixed, as usual with the Gerberians, with suspicion, further fueled by "contempt and arrogance"; indeed, the Shalamari attitude towards Gerber at least could be described thusly quite accurately; an 11th century correspondence quite arrogantly, if rightly, boasted of Shalamari's supremacy in all fields of culture. Accordingly, Toghol-Advisor's early policies when he did come to power mixed greater ties and learning from Gerber's neighbours with xenophobia and nationalism, back then, however, mostly directed against the Valins; the "devalinization" of Gerberian city names was a fairly infamous gesture in its time, especially as Valin influence on Gerber nomenclature was extremelly limited (far greater was the influence of Khemri).
Earlier we have mentioned pragmatic and dogmatic doctrines; back when Toghol-Advisor was, indeed, just an advisor - if a one with unlimited power - he had, as many other great rulers, mixed both. The dogma of Gerber patriotism was mixed with the pragmatic doctrine of self-strenghthening; pragmatical reforms and invitation of specialists mixed with the dogmatical ultranationalist actions, like the devalinization and the fostering of an arteficial church renaissance to block foreign influences. However, back then Toghol-Advisor showed no signs of "evilness", merely a normal level of ruthlessness. Nevertheless, it is safe to assume that an open-minded individual - like he undeniably was, in his personal life - was at least slightly, overcoming certain primal disgust, interested in the rising heresies of the time. The growing cruelty and destruction in war was combined with the fears of Lengels approaching and indeed the cultural reinvigoration caused by Gerber's opening up; on this ground, numerous eschatological cults appeared, playing on the feeling of upcoming doom. As Lengels overran nation after nation in the north, many felt that this was the end of the world; for some, this was a cause to do good deeds, to try and redeem themselves before Life; for others, this was the reason to make the most of it, to feast in the middle of a plague. If there's no future, said some, then all is allowed! All those who thought so were cracked down upon by the church and the state alike, ofcourse, but Toghol-Advisor's increasing recklessness and audacity no doubt had a similar source, if it was not inspired by the eschatologists or the proto"anarchists" themselves. This audacity, however, could also be attributed to Toghol-Advisor's sense of "interesting times" incoming; not a superstitious man at all (some later historians even claimed that he was an agnostic), he believed that this was not the end. The Lengels were but men; they could be slain, they could be defeated. But they were certainly strong, far stronger than Gerber, perhaps stronger than the entire CRA... it was then that Toghol-Advisor, with his usual unconventionality, came up with an innovative decision; if you cannot beat them, he probably thought, join them! And so:
Though Gerber was not yet in alliance in the Lengels, it had already benefited from avoiding clashes with them - and picking up the pieces after them, getting revenge on the hated Tristarians.
Now, it is not our goal here to examine either the diplomatic or the military events of the time in any detail, so we shall skip that, for the most part, giving only the most rudimentary knowledge. In mid-13th century, as mentioned by Aghol-Chronist, while the Lengels overran Davar (another Gerberian enemy) and invaded Tristaria, Toghol-Advisor ordered a backstabbing attack on Tristaria, de facto partitioning it with the Lengels. Initial Gerberian proposal to buy out the rest of Tristaria was rejected; however, soon after, the CRA begun preparing to strike at the Lengels. Thinking their planned invasion senseless and doomed, Toghol-Advisor, after raising initial doubts, suddenly dropped them and helped develop a near-impeccable plan, which then was forwarded to the Lengels - Gerber was already "offended" by all the members of the CRA, and constantly frustrated by it in its territorial ambitions (from even before the Veritasian war, when Khemri and Veritas prevented a Gerberian annexation of the Mogul Empire), while "the Lengels were yet to offend Gerber" and could be worked with. Thus, when the CRA struck against the Lengels, with some surprising initial success, the Gerberians not only protested this invasion early on, but also, after it bogged down somewhat, sturck at the Shalamari, decimating their core lands. The Shalamari struck back; as Toghol-Advisor's armies proved insufficient, he killed the last Cecil-King, trying to pass him off as a scapegoat, and himself fled into the countryside with some supporters, leaving a good half of Gerber's population to die under Shalamari swords. His role in those times was that of a jackal, a traitor, a coward, an irreponsible, manipulative near-stereotypical villain and "bad advisor" of Gerber folklore. His means were often undeniably evil and amoral. But his goal still wasn't evil, it was neutral and pragmatical as usual. That was in 1280, by the Veritasian calendar; in Gerberian calendar, however, it was the First Year of the First Toghol-King, as Toghol-Advisor did have himself coronated. But till the end of that year, he still was the pragmatic Toghol-Advisor, who, upon the failure of his plans, still saw it fit to beg for peace, sacrificing the personal and dogmatic pleasure of revenge for the greater good of his country. In 1281, however, he became the First Toghol-King, a ruthless man who cared not for people or country, who no longer seeked to better anything, who now had only one goal - serving evil, serving it to all that were weaker than he. This man took back - nay, threw aside his past words about peace, and ignored - nay, looked in a strange and vicious glee at the suffering of his people. This man, according to Aghol-Chronist, chose "the former option" when asked by Shalamari and Lengel ambassadors for "war or peace", even though back then it seemed to be equal to suicide.
What had changed him? Did his coronation catch up with him, as did the death of friends and foes alike at the burning Cirta from which he fled into the night? Did he, after that night of greatest fear in his life, lost all fear, including fear of evil and fear of punishment? Was he inspired by evil commited by both sides - and too decided that there was nothing to be lost, and, just as he had once betrayed civilization to ally with the Lengels that seemed to threaten all and used them for his own purposes, now betrayed the very humanity and embraced death, war, destruction and evil in its purest form, again - and again, succesfully - turning what seemed an enemy to all into a formidable ally for himself? Did he simply, as Aghol-Chronist suggests, meditate at the ancient and obscure "Bezerk Altar" and decide to convert to evil, to become at one with it and unleash it might against his enemies? It remains unclear. But if before, his actions were bound - by the presence of the court and of the king, by fear of whatever and by the presence of wealth and power (he retained the latter, at least, but even then, his power, though de jure far strengthened, was de facto curtailed considerably by Gerber's general collapse) that hecould yet lose - now he was free. He was free of morality, free of all human considerations - in this much, the otherwise-apocryphic "Scroll of the Evil Ritual" was correct. The greatest freedom is freedom of - and FROM - conscience. Few have ever achieved it. The First Toghol-King had, and he boasted of it in the open, for he was free from fear as well.
He also immediately showed that he was also free from tradition, from conventionality; immediately after rejecting peace, he begun working feverishly to break what remained of Gerber's ancien regime - already crippled by the Shalamari invasion - and to replace all that was old with things new, unconventional, untraditional. He subjugated the church, and broke the power of the old nobility to replace it with a new one - a one loyal to him and only to him. His entire army was destroyed - alright, he assembled a new one, and instead of sending it to fight in the open, he ordered the use of guerrila tactics, and the Shalamari, harassed and taking horrible losses, had no choice but to retreat. Meanwhile, stunned by the easiness of his success, the First Toghol-King begun freely massacring all that opposed him even slightly, elevating and casting down members of his new court and retinue as he saw fit, destroying and recreating Gerber's culture... he went mad with power, and it gave him a noticeable edge against everyone, for there was nothing that he wasn't prepared to do, or at least attempt. He genocided entire peoples, he helped destroy the Shalamari, he cancelled all the old laws and created new ones, apppointed and demoted heirs at will, and thus, without any foreign help... reinvigorated Gerber, prevented it from sinking into mediocrity, made it unique - if with a negative inuniqueness - and, in destroying what was once, destroyed all that held Gerber back. At the conclusion of his reign, Gerber, though still largely in ruins, had wildly expanded to the east and the west, and thrown out of stagnation. Evil, and chaos, have that effect - the effect, perhaps, of a dangerous, potentially-lethal medicine that might, however, prove a miracle cure if applied in just the right dose.
In any case, however, the First Toghol-King did not live forever, and after his death, Gerber returned to normalcy... or tried to. Ofcourse, the worst excesses of the First Toghol-King were removed by his nephew, the Second Toghol-King, and evil as a state philosophy failed to hold out for long (not that the First Toghol-King actually tried to firmly establish it as such). But the old Gerber was dead, and it could not be resurrected. The old nobility and clergy was mostly slaughtered or destroyed, and old culture was trampled and mangled. In his rampage, the First Toghol-King destroyed all the bridges, and, whether this was his intention or not, made return impossible, there could be no retreat. Thus now, Gerber had no choice but to advance into the unknown future, without looking back, advance and advance, bereft of the old comfort of age-long tradition, but also bereft, as already mentioned, of the many things that held Gerber back in the past. For better or worse, it had no choice but to embrace progress. As in the name of good, great evils are commited, so in the name of evil can good deeds be done.
But once, acts in the name of pure evil were considered impossible, because of their senselessness. Yet they still happened. And so, if for a brief moment, the LINESIIverse gained the dubious honour of housing a genuinely evil state.
Now, some things must be said about LINESIIverse. As can be easily discerned from its name, it is a NES universe; that is to say, the strangest things may happen there, as it is ruled by a moderator and its nations are controlled by players, all of them, ofcourse, NESers. A curious experiment, it is a "fresh start" NES, but not set on Earth; instead, it is set on a different planet. Far from all of its secrets have been revealed by its moderator, probably to keep the suspense. As of the 13th century, it sat at the end of one war - during which Veritas, a southern theocratic monotheist state otherwise fairly similar to Rome, was thwarted in its bid for domination and its people, the Valins, dispersed across the Eastern Ocean - and the beginning of another, as Lengels - nearly the same as Mongols, but under different influences - poured into the Cradle (main concentration of civilizations) from the north. By then, several greater civilizations had established themselves in the Cradle - not counting Veritas, we must mention the theocratic, sophisticated, unique Shalamari, militaristic, autocratic, Negroid Gorin and the Graeco-Egyptian, philosophical Khemri - these three were the nations that brought down Veritas and, as the Crystal Ridge Alliance, now stood poised to clash with the Lengels. There were lesser countries in the CRA as well - the various periphereal, semi-barbaric nations of the west and the post-Veritasian nations of the east, and lastly, Gerber, an ancient, but weak and backwater nation, notable for its reckless militarism and xenophobia, and constant frustration of great territorial ambitions.
It is there that evil would take hold, ofcourse. Never the best of people in the first place, with their constant defeats and isolation the Gerberians grew ever more bitter. Their wars, initially driven by the logic of lebensraum and expansion, gradually gained an element of vengeance, and after a while Gerber was beginning to simply lash out at all around it, like a mad caged lion. Though Gerber once had a proud oral tradition and sophisticated culture, all that mostly stagnated and died away by now, and foreign influence that might have reinvigorated Gerber's culture was viciously resisted, until recently. The early 13th century saw an apparent thaw, as Gerber entered the CRA and begun inviting foreign specialists for great reforms and building projects. It was being pushed onwards to progress by the man who would later turn it around and push it with even greater force in the different direction; back then, he was known as Toghol-Advisor. The increasingly senile, corrupt and weak kings of the Cecilid bloodline depended on their advisors and courtiers, and they often got the real power in the state; however, they usually were soon displaced by newer favourites and overthrown by conspiracies. Toghol-Advisor displaced all those that stood in his path, and with all his ingenuity and great capacity for intrigue, quashed conspiracies like bugs, eventually growing bored and playing them off against each other intricately.
Just as we have examined Gerber's past for the factors that drove it to evil, so we must examine the past of Toghol-Advisor; alas, little is known of the man who, for a few decades until his death, made pure evil a state philosophy. Alas, we know little of his past, but for Aghol-Chronist's scroll "The Most Evil Man in the World":
Aghol-Chronist said:
It is not a source that might be considered completely reliable; surprisingly enough, despite its title, it is more similar to Togholist propaganda than to anti-Togholist. However, we have no better sources, so this will have to do. We have no knowledge of Trekar-General, but some unofficial Khemri sources do mention an "Ambassador Krar of the Gerbers", who, with an unspecified entourge, arrived in Khadon travelling from Shalamari; as before that, the Gerbers didn't have normal diplomatic relations with Shalamari (ever since the 10th century, when the Shalamari religious aggression caused one of the first known cases of xenophobic reaction in Gerber, back then culminating with the expulsion of all Crystalists (followers of the Shalamari religion)), it would seem that Kurar-Ambassador did play an important role in the diplomacy of the age. In any case, Toghol had from the start been more exposed to foreign cultures than most other Gerberians, and thus gained a far greater knowledge of them - knowledge mixed, as usual with the Gerberians, with suspicion, further fueled by "contempt and arrogance"; indeed, the Shalamari attitude towards Gerber at least could be described thusly quite accurately; an 11th century correspondence quite arrogantly, if rightly, boasted of Shalamari's supremacy in all fields of culture. Accordingly, Toghol-Advisor's early policies when he did come to power mixed greater ties and learning from Gerber's neighbours with xenophobia and nationalism, back then, however, mostly directed against the Valins; the "devalinization" of Gerberian city names was a fairly infamous gesture in its time, especially as Valin influence on Gerber nomenclature was extremelly limited (far greater was the influence of Khemri).
Earlier we have mentioned pragmatic and dogmatic doctrines; back when Toghol-Advisor was, indeed, just an advisor - if a one with unlimited power - he had, as many other great rulers, mixed both. The dogma of Gerber patriotism was mixed with the pragmatic doctrine of self-strenghthening; pragmatical reforms and invitation of specialists mixed with the dogmatical ultranationalist actions, like the devalinization and the fostering of an arteficial church renaissance to block foreign influences. However, back then Toghol-Advisor showed no signs of "evilness", merely a normal level of ruthlessness. Nevertheless, it is safe to assume that an open-minded individual - like he undeniably was, in his personal life - was at least slightly, overcoming certain primal disgust, interested in the rising heresies of the time. The growing cruelty and destruction in war was combined with the fears of Lengels approaching and indeed the cultural reinvigoration caused by Gerber's opening up; on this ground, numerous eschatological cults appeared, playing on the feeling of upcoming doom. As Lengels overran nation after nation in the north, many felt that this was the end of the world; for some, this was a cause to do good deeds, to try and redeem themselves before Life; for others, this was the reason to make the most of it, to feast in the middle of a plague. If there's no future, said some, then all is allowed! All those who thought so were cracked down upon by the church and the state alike, ofcourse, but Toghol-Advisor's increasing recklessness and audacity no doubt had a similar source, if it was not inspired by the eschatologists or the proto"anarchists" themselves. This audacity, however, could also be attributed to Toghol-Advisor's sense of "interesting times" incoming; not a superstitious man at all (some later historians even claimed that he was an agnostic), he believed that this was not the end. The Lengels were but men; they could be slain, they could be defeated. But they were certainly strong, far stronger than Gerber, perhaps stronger than the entire CRA... it was then that Toghol-Advisor, with his usual unconventionality, came up with an innovative decision; if you cannot beat them, he probably thought, join them! And so:
Aghol-Chronist said:
Though Gerber was not yet in alliance in the Lengels, it had already benefited from avoiding clashes with them - and picking up the pieces after them, getting revenge on the hated Tristarians.
Now, it is not our goal here to examine either the diplomatic or the military events of the time in any detail, so we shall skip that, for the most part, giving only the most rudimentary knowledge. In mid-13th century, as mentioned by Aghol-Chronist, while the Lengels overran Davar (another Gerberian enemy) and invaded Tristaria, Toghol-Advisor ordered a backstabbing attack on Tristaria, de facto partitioning it with the Lengels. Initial Gerberian proposal to buy out the rest of Tristaria was rejected; however, soon after, the CRA begun preparing to strike at the Lengels. Thinking their planned invasion senseless and doomed, Toghol-Advisor, after raising initial doubts, suddenly dropped them and helped develop a near-impeccable plan, which then was forwarded to the Lengels - Gerber was already "offended" by all the members of the CRA, and constantly frustrated by it in its territorial ambitions (from even before the Veritasian war, when Khemri and Veritas prevented a Gerberian annexation of the Mogul Empire), while "the Lengels were yet to offend Gerber" and could be worked with. Thus, when the CRA struck against the Lengels, with some surprising initial success, the Gerberians not only protested this invasion early on, but also, after it bogged down somewhat, sturck at the Shalamari, decimating their core lands. The Shalamari struck back; as Toghol-Advisor's armies proved insufficient, he killed the last Cecil-King, trying to pass him off as a scapegoat, and himself fled into the countryside with some supporters, leaving a good half of Gerber's population to die under Shalamari swords. His role in those times was that of a jackal, a traitor, a coward, an irreponsible, manipulative near-stereotypical villain and "bad advisor" of Gerber folklore. His means were often undeniably evil and amoral. But his goal still wasn't evil, it was neutral and pragmatical as usual. That was in 1280, by the Veritasian calendar; in Gerberian calendar, however, it was the First Year of the First Toghol-King, as Toghol-Advisor did have himself coronated. But till the end of that year, he still was the pragmatic Toghol-Advisor, who, upon the failure of his plans, still saw it fit to beg for peace, sacrificing the personal and dogmatic pleasure of revenge for the greater good of his country. In 1281, however, he became the First Toghol-King, a ruthless man who cared not for people or country, who no longer seeked to better anything, who now had only one goal - serving evil, serving it to all that were weaker than he. This man took back - nay, threw aside his past words about peace, and ignored - nay, looked in a strange and vicious glee at the suffering of his people. This man, according to Aghol-Chronist, chose "the former option" when asked by Shalamari and Lengel ambassadors for "war or peace", even though back then it seemed to be equal to suicide.
What had changed him? Did his coronation catch up with him, as did the death of friends and foes alike at the burning Cirta from which he fled into the night? Did he, after that night of greatest fear in his life, lost all fear, including fear of evil and fear of punishment? Was he inspired by evil commited by both sides - and too decided that there was nothing to be lost, and, just as he had once betrayed civilization to ally with the Lengels that seemed to threaten all and used them for his own purposes, now betrayed the very humanity and embraced death, war, destruction and evil in its purest form, again - and again, succesfully - turning what seemed an enemy to all into a formidable ally for himself? Did he simply, as Aghol-Chronist suggests, meditate at the ancient and obscure "Bezerk Altar" and decide to convert to evil, to become at one with it and unleash it might against his enemies? It remains unclear. But if before, his actions were bound - by the presence of the court and of the king, by fear of whatever and by the presence of wealth and power (he retained the latter, at least, but even then, his power, though de jure far strengthened, was de facto curtailed considerably by Gerber's general collapse) that hecould yet lose - now he was free. He was free of morality, free of all human considerations - in this much, the otherwise-apocryphic "Scroll of the Evil Ritual" was correct. The greatest freedom is freedom of - and FROM - conscience. Few have ever achieved it. The First Toghol-King had, and he boasted of it in the open, for he was free from fear as well.
He also immediately showed that he was also free from tradition, from conventionality; immediately after rejecting peace, he begun working feverishly to break what remained of Gerber's ancien regime - already crippled by the Shalamari invasion - and to replace all that was old with things new, unconventional, untraditional. He subjugated the church, and broke the power of the old nobility to replace it with a new one - a one loyal to him and only to him. His entire army was destroyed - alright, he assembled a new one, and instead of sending it to fight in the open, he ordered the use of guerrila tactics, and the Shalamari, harassed and taking horrible losses, had no choice but to retreat. Meanwhile, stunned by the easiness of his success, the First Toghol-King begun freely massacring all that opposed him even slightly, elevating and casting down members of his new court and retinue as he saw fit, destroying and recreating Gerber's culture... he went mad with power, and it gave him a noticeable edge against everyone, for there was nothing that he wasn't prepared to do, or at least attempt. He genocided entire peoples, he helped destroy the Shalamari, he cancelled all the old laws and created new ones, apppointed and demoted heirs at will, and thus, without any foreign help... reinvigorated Gerber, prevented it from sinking into mediocrity, made it unique - if with a negative inuniqueness - and, in destroying what was once, destroyed all that held Gerber back. At the conclusion of his reign, Gerber, though still largely in ruins, had wildly expanded to the east and the west, and thrown out of stagnation. Evil, and chaos, have that effect - the effect, perhaps, of a dangerous, potentially-lethal medicine that might, however, prove a miracle cure if applied in just the right dose.
In any case, however, the First Toghol-King did not live forever, and after his death, Gerber returned to normalcy... or tried to. Ofcourse, the worst excesses of the First Toghol-King were removed by his nephew, the Second Toghol-King, and evil as a state philosophy failed to hold out for long (not that the First Toghol-King actually tried to firmly establish it as such). But the old Gerber was dead, and it could not be resurrected. The old nobility and clergy was mostly slaughtered or destroyed, and old culture was trampled and mangled. In his rampage, the First Toghol-King destroyed all the bridges, and, whether this was his intention or not, made return impossible, there could be no retreat. Thus now, Gerber had no choice but to advance into the unknown future, without looking back, advance and advance, bereft of the old comfort of age-long tradition, but also bereft, as already mentioned, of the many things that held Gerber back in the past. For better or worse, it had no choice but to embrace progress. As in the name of good, great evils are commited, so in the name of evil can good deeds be done.
das
Regeneration In Process
Well duh. Frankly I'm not decided on that one myself; I did send orders, but nothing groundbreaking should happen yet, I'm still recovering from that Shalamari rampage.
das
Regeneration In Process
Yep, I love such freedom of action, it was worth the near-genocide of my entire population. Sadly I'm hemmed in between several powerful empires, so I will need all the unity and innovativeness that I could get just to survive...
Iggy, couple of Q's
I take it I can only continue one project (the island pinicles) at this moment in time.
The small Nurmaferian warlords, are they going to get absorbed by me? Or do I have to beat up the small isles of Anranfer myself
I take it I can only continue one project (the island pinicles) at this moment in time.
The small Nurmaferian warlords, are they going to get absorbed by me? Or do I have to beat up the small isles of Anranfer myself
das
Regeneration In Process
Glad to see you like it. I had intended to write it long ago but various things got in the way.
Yes, you have to finish the pinnacles before adopting the new project.
And the Nurmaferi warlords won't just surrender to you. You'll have to bring around your integration yourself, or just leave them to fester on their remaining lands.
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