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Before there can be an introduction of our worlds and our spiritual culture, the sheer format of this report necessitates a preface. No doubt the reader has accessed these files to find what can be known of Timeworld; seeking secrets and gossip, all the "nuts and the bolts of the thing," as my friend Marshall Delta Stiev would say. But the core of Zandrian life and power is in the history. This episodic history rests in myself, the chief librarian; and the survivors of my bloodied people, a priesthood known as the Sol'Var.
My name is Jayson Ballart, a name notable for its minor role in history, as you shall see. My position is, however, a complex one; sitting at the apex of power, mending the wounds of civil war, a mediator among vicious enemies. My task is simple: to join the hands of Marshall Delta Stiev and Trevalin Delvana.
Toward that end, I have betrayed my brotherhood and my vows to my masters -- although never have I betrayed my vows to God or to the people of Zandrian space, a responsibility that superseded my intellectual allegiances. History will illustrate this, although I do not expect to be trusted again fully in my lifetime.
I tell you this because I tell all that follows. I am known, as are all the Sol'Var, for my objectivity, my reason, and my perfect (some accusingly say eidetic) recall. But my ancestors were also known for this. What they possessed was, however, closer to cold calculation than true objectivity; and it was, in the end, that same failed logic, that led my compatriots and myself to feed them to the Shon'Var's blade. Thus, I must reason that my objectivity is also an uncertainty, and though I have endeavored to remove emotion and prejudice from this document, only history can reveal my success or failure.
I rest my case in the firm conviction that, although I may harbor prejudices, my view of history and of this moment is many factors closer to true objectivity than either my forebears or my protégés, Delta Stiev and Trevalin Delvana. That being said, I will introduce the New Zandrian Order.
[All three names are still commonly used in conversation. Timeworld's leaders always emphasize New Order, but Quin Jon's rulers still refer to the Zandrian Empire. It is an issue of some contention.]
Overview: |
Zandria has recently emerged from a bloody civil war, waged mostly on an innocent front. Over a period of 87 years battles were waged overtly on Third World; and covertly on both Timeworld and Quin Jon as war of assassins.
Census counts place the dead from war in the last century centuries at over two billion, or approximately one third of the present population of the empire. Despite constant threat of war, the artisan guild of Timeworkers has thrived (having been mostly spared from the violence because they manufactured the arms and the raw materials for all combatants). Presently the empire is centered on Quin Jon and its nominal capital the city of Quin City, a sprawling metropolis -- decadent by Zandrian standards. The real power is on the throne of Timeworld with its opposing elliptical orbit that brings it close to The Timepiece, the source of Zandrian power. >From Timeworld the truce has empowered a co-consulate of the Shon'Var Marshall Delta Stiev and my own Sol'Var protégé Trevalin Delvana, a young but potentially dangerous man. Time will tell. This pair is the real power in the empire, and they rule from our palace built of Truewood in a forest of Truewood Trees on Timeworld; a terraformed planet still in its infancy and with violent weather. |
Navigation:CoLC Index |
Index:Q-dex / Technology / Magic
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Q-dex: |
T 344.2131/325.697WM 880.7468/756.11Our reliance on mystical energy is apparent from the Quantum Index. With large amounts of essence and manna, and little energy produced in our space; technology is next to impossible to manipulate. Manna and essence are produced uniquely from a single point in our zone -- a pulsar named the Timepiece -- which will be explained later. Infrequent, though long and powerful, mystical storms plague the zone, especially near the Timepiece; where the concentration of mystical energy is greatest. It is a dangerous area and little can survive near it. Zandria is currently experiencing a peaceful transition of power, as former rival factions of the Church of Zandross unite through two rulers -- a co-consul -- becoming the first non-monarchical government to rule since the death of Empress Liv II. At the time of this writing, there has been discovered no other sentient species in Zandrian space, though the possibility of another's existence is always there. |
Technology: |
The technological story of Zandria is the story of The Timepiece, a pulsar so named because it rotates precisely once per second. The Timepiece is the source of the seeming magical properties of both Timewood and of the inhuman skill of the Shon'Var, but its tremendous beam silences technology.
The technological level of Zandria is quite limited. The closer a ship comes to The Timepiece, the greater the interference with all things mechanical. Electric/magnetic items are all that run on Timeworld, and only shielded jets can operate to ferry passengers between star cruisers and the planet's surface. Chip-based and magnetic-based technologies are worthless in all of Zandrian space. Electronic record-keeping is nonexistent. It was the need for reliable information and precise projection, actually, which spawned the Sol'Var, with our devotion to reason and our phenomenal memories. We are the librarians of an Empire. Starships do not operate well anywhere in Zandrian space. Only ships built of Timewood can shield the workings from the pulsar's influence. Very few ships built of Timewood with their living-trunk cores are owned outside of Quin Jon and Timeworld. At the fringes of The Timepiece's influence, passengers and cargo are transferred at large space stations between Time Drive ships and interstellar ships with technological drives. Advanced multiple drive ships are operated only by the Shon'Var, and are forbidden to the Senate and merchants of Quin Jon. There is no broadcast media in Zandrian space, but communications are possible using shielded communications consoles tapping the power of the pulsar and its intense carrier wave. |
Magic: |
At the center of Zandrian space is a binary system where a pulsar and an aged yellow star circle each other. The yellow star is known as Mond and the pulsar, which rotates precisely once per second, is The Timepiece. The Timepiece is many things at once.
The priest in me tells me that it is where God resides, or where he focuses his presence. The librarian and scientist in me will tell you that it is an antenna for Manna, a broadcast beacon of intense power. The Timepiece is the source of the power of every individual of both the Shon'Var and the Artisan Guild. It is in the glow of its strobe that Jerald Zandross became more than he had been, and it was where he and Liv Stone learned that The Timepiece could be used as a weapon, and that violence could be used to fuse a society. The elliptical orbit of Timeworld brings it quite close to The Timepiece during our winter. During that time, the pulse of The Timepiece is palpable in the furnishings and the floors. It radiates like a rising and falling hum in all the buildings of Timeworld and The Palace. It is a magnificent time to be here, and many are intoxicated by the presence. There are many deaths in the arena floor as emotions and abilities pique. But the challenges are almost always between students. Graduates of The Palace are better able to control their emotions during our long winters. Students who cannot control their emotions or who are inefficient in the administration of their blades do not graduate. There are two magical orders that have coexisted in the past and are endeavoring to do so again. The first was the Order of Shon'Var, a church of individualistic warrior/esthetes. The Shon'Var is a church only in-as-much as it bands together. Decentralized and without organized worship, the Shon'Var prospered as they brought peace to Zandria much like knights at a round table. Shon'Var use the Timepiece on an individual level, to power their bodies wherever Manna is available. They can also turn a knife blade or a projectile (thus the lack of projectile weapons in my space). The Sol'Var, worshipping in our own temples, discovered that this energy could be used at greater distances than an arm's length, a skill the Shon'Var have never mastered. As a Sol'Var, I can project my will, channeling the Timepiece and God's will over great distances. Thus, though we were few in number next to the Deputtass millions, we held our strongholds through two centuries of hostilities. The magic of The Timepiece has been put to little practical use. It drives starships and animates cadres of killers. This is our shame. |
Size: |
There are three populated planets in two systems within our realm. Two more planets harbor human life on a small scale. The bulk of population is on Third World, a planet-sized moon circling a gaseous giant. Second in population is Quin Jon, having the same land mass as Third World, but with half the population. Timeworld houses a transient population hovering around five million, including support and Guild staff. |
Population: |
Six billion people fall under the Shon'Var protectorate: four billion on Third World, less than two billion on Quin Jon, and the rest on Timeworld, and on mining colonies in planetary asteroid belts, as well as on the two remaining terraformed planets. |
Climate and Geography: |
Two of our five habitable worlds are naturally occurring. One is the world-sized moon of the gas giant Gypsy, my home planet of Third World.
Gypsy is in a neighboring system to the binary one, and circles a star called The Apple, a bright red star that burns cold and long by cosmological standards. Third World is rich in plant and animal life, and all of its waters are fresh. There are few mountains of note, and tectonic activity is light. Weather extremes are great and planet wide. There are no polar ice caps because Third World circles not the suns Mond and Timepiece, but instead circles Gypsy; thus, no part of the world is permanently on an edge to the heat of Mond. Because Gypsy has a highly elliptical orbit around Mond, heat exchange in the atmosphere does spark intense storm activity at times, but the population is prepared in houses bolstered by Timewood. The soil of Third World is rich and supplies abundantly the tables of all of Zandrian space. The food grown there is like Timewood in that it grows in the pulse of The Timepiece and has slightly mystical properties in that it can be intoxicating and aphrodisiacal. This fact alone explains the sexually open nature of my people. It is also exported to other mystical zones as a gourmet novelty. A second moon of Gypsy also harbors life, but only dimly. Triumph's moon was the original site of the mining colony that founded Zandrian society. It is abundant in mineral resources and has breathable air, but is almost exclusively barren and dry. Where there is water on the surface of the moon, there are oases of life, but nothing grows there that humans can eat. Triumph's Moon is also a weigh station for minerals and gases mined in the upper atmosphere of Gypsy. These raw materials are for export only, and the scale of their production is limited. The inhabitants of Triumph's moon are few, numbering only about 10,000 and completely dependent on supplies ferried from the rest of the empire their existence. Triumph's moon was almost untouched by the civil war. Quin Jon was once very fertile, but little grows there today that the people can reap. Only small gardens which dot every poor neighborhood and a few large farms and vineyards operated by senatorial families. Poor environmental management has poisoned much of the water, and while there is plenty to drink, there is little left to irrigate with. No well-to-do citizen of Quin Jon would eat home grown food. Instead, it is sold to the poor at inflated prices in the kind of unofficial economy that seems to flourish in any authoritarian bureaucracy. There is ample arable land on Quin Jon, and it may be able to feed its own population in time, but the land is held by wealthy families "in trust" and left to pasture on estates as large as a hundred miles across, worked as veritable serfdoms. 90% of the planet's surface is occupied by only 4% of the population as the bulk of its people huddle in packed cities. My brothers, the Shon'Var elite and my own protégé, are making steps to change this, but the issues are ancient and entrenched. Timeworld is the jewel of our empire, the home of the Shon'Var Deputtass and the true seat of power. It is a largely barren world, volcanic with great plate shifts. Although there is no naturally occurring vegetation or plant life on Timeworld, the volcanic ash has settled into caldera where the soil is fertile. The Shon'Var have cultivated this resource and have more than a hundred forests for Truewood growing. Water is abundant and the steppes of the caldera are planted with grasses to hold the soil. Food is also grown here, and less than half of the food the Shon'Var planet needs is imported from Third World. In the Largest of the caldera sits The Palace, a beautiful, expansive metropolis fashioned in a rainbow of swirling wood tones. Between the towns and forests of Timeworld lie vast expanses of hostile volcanic rock and sulfuric lakes and oceans. Freshwater is recycled from steam that shoots from geysers at many plate joints in the planets crust. The air is sulfuric, but breathable, and in time, the expanding grasses and forests will make the atmosphere more hospitable. The last planet is one under construction, so to speak. A dead planet once teeming with living organisms and thus possessing soil and large oceans. Little of the life that once thrived on the small fertile oasis of Jewel survives, but grasses hold back erosion and lichens and small invertebrates abound. In the same system as Third World, Jewel offers an opportunity for increased productivity and influence of Third World's inhabitants. Growing offworld plants on Jewel as well as intense windstorm activity has proven problematic and is currently stalling development. |
Flora and Fauna: |
Animal life is relatively similar on the different worlds of Zandrian space. Two thousand years of interplanetary travel, with rats and pests hidden in hulls and among shipments, has introduced new life to all the planets that eventually became endemic. Most notorious of all the creatures transported and now present even on remote mining camps is the Duma.
Duma are quadripedal and omnivorous, similar to bears, but smaller and quick as a rat is quick. The first deputies of the Triumvirate colonies, charged with enforcing profit above law, were referred to as Duma. Duma are the only hunters of note among our animals. They breed quickly, have venomous saliva, and attack in packs where they need to in order to bring down large prey, such as deer. Despite all efforts to control them, duma have grown in numbers or held steady. Children and aging adults are still taken by Duma in the countryside with a distressing regularity, and they live in the sewers of all our major cities, even at The Palace. With one major predator, the size of herbivorous animals has remained small and their numbers maintained only by rapid breeding. Any attempt to completely eradicate the Duma, then, would alter an ecological balance.. Timewood and grasses are all that are native to our worlds. But flowering plants and grains, with their concomitant symbiotic pollinators, were successfully introduced and now flourish. The size of the Timewood forests are greatly reduced. All food grown in Zandrian space retains much of the property of the Timepiece: food that is eaten or certain plants that may be smoked, bring on a euphoric high and accent the heightened awareness and power of the person so using. On Timeworld, the incense of burning leaves fills every home and public place, and the mind is always being continually opened to and intoxicated by the Timepiece. There is, accordingly, an illicit trade in certain of these intoxicating plants. It is tolerated loosely but not officially sanctioned by the Shon'Var. |
History: |
“Courtiers are sent by masters who desire better soldiers. We welcome them, and offer them both everything and nothing. They lack discipline and quietude, and cannot hear the peaceful beat of the timepiece. After a while they leave with no answers, no stronger and no sharper as men. They are nearly always raised to be polite and to trust their eyes instead of their hands. They are invariably very proper in their comportment, very reasoned and objective. They are civilized men. I have no such handicap.”
The history of The New Order is really the history of Zandrian philosophy and of The Timepiece, a localized anomaly worshipped as the vessel of God by some. It is also the history of two guilds, one of craftsmen who work art into a wood hard as stone, or Timewood, and one of warriors who in ancient days provided stability for billions, and who vie to do so again. These are known as the order of Deputtass, who worship in the Shon'Var temples. I am the Historian Jayson Ballart, a descendent of the first man killed by the hand of our patron saint Jerald Zandross. I am of the order the New Sol'Var, the rebirth of a church that effected the progress of this sector of space for the past 1,300 years, mostly in a negative way, as you will see and to my shame, but not without contribution. There is more to The New Order, to the terraformed worlds and to the naturally life-giving worlds of Quin Jon (also known still as Zandria) and Quentin's Moon, itself as large as many worlds and quite industrialized and green. We still mine minerals and gases and we still manufacture, but these are economics and they feed ignorant masses, without which no empire can thrive. I will attempt to convey the central issues of Zandrian history, although the masses are understandably implied. I will attempt to be brief, or as brief as my mnemonic abilities will allow. Where I deem appropriate or and outright necessity, I shall be precise ... where the dates and exact locations are secondary to their influence in my history, I shall be general in my approach. I will not waste your time -- respected on Timeworld as no where else. What is now known as The New Colonies was founded 23 centuries ago by colonists and miners. This handful of stars was a rough sector in its youth. Where shipboard discipline waned in the absence of its captains' influence, law was administered by combinations of marshals and vigilante mobs. The mobs proved more effective in the long run and marshals' positions became largely civil, serving civil warrants, settling domestic disputes and delivering persons accused of minor crimes to mining colonies that served as prisons. Very few crimes were considered minor in a place where all survived by a thin link to the rest of the universe and where food, air, and resources were scarce. Those were uncertain days, perhaps as much so as these have become. The history of the Zandrian people is the history of the blade. Projectile weapons have been outlawed since the founding of what was then known simply as the Triumvirate colonies (so-called because the original settlers were bankrolled by a trio of extremely wealthy families). A risk of puncture in a ship was simply not within allowable limits, and even heat-generating weapons such as lasers were outlawed in a society that lived on enriched oxygen. Though these times have passed, the birth of Zandross and his supernatural abilities made the blade an eternal weapon of choice throughout the empire, and no one has dishonored themselves with a laser or a "gun" in recorded memory. There is no honor in dispatching an opponent from a distance: This cannot serve justice. Colonists then lived in cramped and intensely volatile societies, though, and colony members took to wearing knives. Over time, the duel became the preferred method of settling interpersonal dispute. Crimes, such as rape, murder, and theft of property that resulted in danger to the colony were punished by mob justice. Some colonies adopted arena justice where the accused fought Deputies of extraordinary knife-wielding skill. These Deputies are still with Zandrian society today, where they act as mercenaries, executioners and assassins. Persons of ingenuity hired out persons of martial skill and began carving out territories where they managed goods. Those planets that were workable for terraforming were gaining in both productivity and habitability and the profits for these lords were becoming noticeable even in the highest levels of the sponsors' corporations. Into this budding feudal environment came a young orphaned boy named Jerald Zandross. Jerald was raised in a colony clinging to a barren rock at the edge of the principle star of the endeavor: Mond. Jerald Zandross was educated by computer programs on the observation deck of a ship anchored to the moon, and after lessons, the young child would sit in the observation deck and watch the Timepiece, a pulsar so named because it revolved precisely once per second, or so closely to that rate that the difference was negligible even by the standards of a star faring society. It was from the Timepiece that a six-year-old boy began to sense a rhythm of more than just time, but also an inward rhythm that passed through his body. He developed very quickly and finished all of the educational software by the age of 8. Jerald killed his first man in open combat at age 9, a man 30 years his senior and 90 pounds his better by the name of Jarllsen Ballart (an ancestor, I'm proud to say). It was an offhand insult about his parentage that drew the challenge and the man, not wishing to kill the boy, tried to dissuade Jerald and to placate him. But the challenge, if left unanswered, left him open to a covert attack. Jerald was within his rights, and the colony of 300 or so gathered to watch Jerald die. His vitriolic attacks on the older man had left no doubt about the rightness of the fight, and Ballart brought his blade, jeweled and curved and 10 inches long, to bear on the boy, hoping to only wound him. It was at that moment that what was to be known as Zandrian Magic was revealed. The speed of the boy Jerald was difficult to follow with the eye, and he drew blood on Ballart's stomach within seconds of the fight's beginning. Witnesses reported that Ballart, an excellent fighter, put up a stolid defense, but that the boy moved so quickly that his child's blade drew blood where it seemed he could not have struck. Inside of two minutes, Ballart lay dead on the cavern floor and Jerald picked up the jeweled blade, the blade he carried for the rest of his life. “I eliminated stockades and prisons. Let there be no more of such weak morality. We are a people of violent resource, of bloody hands and not of bleeding hearts. There are deputies to enforce laws and they were born to killing. If it is necessary to punish a person, let it be done fully and quickly. To take a person's life can be a necessity, but to take his freedom, to chain him and to make him a burden on decent folk, that is a crime in itself. We will waste no more resource on prisons: They make us weak.”
The deputy that day, the mediator of battle, was Liv Stone. Born to killing floors like Jerald Zandria, she was quick with a blade, small like most of the best fighters and fast like a cat. She was still young enough at the age of 25 to worship this martial skill as an end worth pursuing to any length. There was tremendous money to be made in those days in the service of the feudal bosses. Liv was ambitious and although Jerald's precocious intellect and blood lust drove most to seek other company, she became the first Friend Jerald had ever had. And his first disciple, sitting staring at the Timepiece in the observation deck, she too felt the rhythm and she too began to sense the power of her true intellect and her violent nature.. That was the beginning of the Zandrian Empire, an empire ruled as a benevolent autocracy until his death nearly 200 years later. In the shrines to the religions of Shon'Var which remain (no Sol'Var temples avoided the destruction that was to come), Liv is shown always at his side, sometimes in less than modest clothing, often with her breasts exposed, for she was a beautiful and vain woman. She was also the first true Marshall of Zandrian society, that warrior elite whose religion would sweep over the Colonies nearly 2200 years after the birth of the Empire. Despite his two wives which followed her, hers is the only face represented in temple carvings of Timewood. No photograph was ever taken of her, or of Zandross either, though if the carvings are accurate, she was lithe and beautiful with full breasts and he was tall and quick with eyes as sharp as his blade. By age 12, with the able assistance, Jerald Zandross was nominal head of the colony where he was born and where his parents soon after died in an explosive decompression. He led well, although with a bloody hand, and the colony grew fat from his administration. By age 20, he had united the five feudal lords of the planet Quin Jon, on which shone the rhythm of the Timepiece and where grew the Timewood, made strong and beautiful beyond measure by the soil, the temperate climate, and in some mystical way, the rays of The Timepiece. He also had a following of nearly 100 of the order of Deputtass, the order of violent priests who would one day destroy the Empire. Jerald always knew a little more than his minions, and always held out some knowledge from all but his wife Liv. By the time he was 20, he had developed a way of using his magical abilities, courtesy of The Timepiece, to probe for lies; a skill still rare to this day. This was how he knew that one of the feudal lords was setting a trap, a woman of dark eyes, a former Colony Deputy named Chang Jo, who had reported Jerald as a threat to the Triumvirate corporation. When the small army of mercenaries descended with their swords and their stunner whips, they saw a force one fifth their size. No Triumvirate soldier lived through the night but one, allowed to return with tales of knives that were turned by an invisible shield and hands that shattered skulls with a single slap. More than 400 died that night, but only four of them were Deputtass. At sunrise, before word of the massacre spread, The Deputtass descended on the fortress compound of Chang Jo and decimated its population. The element of surprise was described later by Liv Zandross as "exquisitely funny." “I couldn't help laughing at the look on Chang Jo's face when she realized she was cornered. She was quick, but we were so much quicker, me and my Lord Jerald. She threw her knife at his throat and I thought he was simply going to turn it with that way he has. But he caught it! Can you imagine? I was enthralled. It was simply divine! I thought he would throw it back, but he just gave it to me and that was the first time I saw him really let loose ... he punched the air and the shock wave from his fist caught her full on the chest. I mean she just exploded! Broke the wall behind her, and that was paneled with Timewood! Not really funny, I know, I know. But just as entertaining. I mean, you really had to be there. That was the moment I knew Jerald would rule all of this empire. I was so much in love. I still carry the knife right here. I wish I could unsheathe it, but you know how it is.”
That was the birth of the legend of Zandria and the birth of an empire that never has expanded, but which never has withdrawn. Within another decade after the skirmish at Chang Jo's compound, Jerald had more than five thousand disciples spread throughout Quin Jon and the attacks by the Triumvirate had ceased, turned away by pilots whose reflexes were in sync with the timepiece. A religion had begun, a revolution underway. Jerald Zandross spent hour upon hour in tune with The Timepiece, kneeling on a platform of purple Timewood. He gradually came to an understanding that the force which fed his soldiers and himself was the hand of God. “God speaks from the Timepiece and we are his chosen servants. He has enlisted me to lead you on a path. We must be ever more selective in who we choose to deputize, for we are effectively ordaining our warriors. God has chosen the path of the blade for us to make his.”
This was the birth of the religions of Shon'Var and Sol'Var, although Sol'Var, with its zealotry and jihad, would not emerge for more than a hundred years. The schism, as Shon'Var promoted tolerance and stewardship and Sol'Var advocated adherence to the one religion, would eventually cost the lives of billions. After the death of Jerald Zandross, aged 194 years, his oldest son, also named Jerald, but simply referred to as Marshall Jerald because he succeeded his mother as Marshall of the Deputtass after her violent death, took the reigns of the empire and served also as proconsul, emperor in all but name as a senate placated by wealth and peace saw no need to reign in his power. He also ruled over an empire that practiced diplomacy with one hand extended, the other on knife hilt. These were peaceful years for Quin Jon, the mining colonies, and the outlying worlds. There was never another prison built in the Zandrian Empire, but more than one legislative debate was settled on the slick Timewood floor of the Arena, where one senator sheathed his blade in the heart of another. These were epic contests too, for no man could rise to Senator without first going through the ranks of Deputtass. (With the decline in the fiber of the families of the Senate, we have reached the time where no Shon'Var Knight has sat in chambers there for nearly a thousand years.) Many Senators, sensing the decline of their second century beginning, would feel obliged to challenge a younger man to battle over a piece of incidental language. Many chose to die in this way in order to dwell with God in The Timepiece. Within a hundred years of the death of Zandross, this was the a common cause of death for elders and for the terminally ill. They would solicit a fight over a seemingly forgotten and insignificant slight. It was very poor form to refuse, and a trusted neighbor would be obliged to kill the old person in single combat, a combat which the elder would scarcely be said to defend herself. Afterwards, a wake and a party, until in time it was a great and solemn honor to be challenged thus. “There is no honor in simply accessing God through the Timepiece. There is no nirvana in that. The path of violent justice must be tempered with mercy and the true morality. Any other exercise of God's power can only lead to chaos.”
It was during the reign of Marshall Jerald that the rise of the church of Sol'Var reached importance. Common enough the religious schools with their martial arts training and their loyalty to The Timepiece wherein God dwelt. New to this mix of ideas was the zealotry which pervaded this branching of the church, which worshipped the spinning star not as the home of God, but as the person of God. There was very little tolerance for non-believers, with adherents to other religions being particularly suspect. Over time, the church of Sol'Var exercised more and more influence, until openly challenged by the granddaughter of Marshall Jerald, Liv II. That was when the scope of the Sol'Var's powers were revealed. Liv was attacked in her court while entertaining guests and was dead within minutes. No attacker ever showed a face, but all the occupants of the room reported seeing a flash of heat strike her throne again and again while she was driven to her knees, repelling wave after wave of heat that blew through the doors and drove her backward. The power of The Timepiece, channeled through her open palms, was too little to save her. She had no children. The Sol'Var were driven underground and the senate ruled the Zandrian Empire for more than ten centuries while Sol'Var, with its honorless priests, bided time and won inroads into the Senate. Three hundred years ago and nineteen hundred after the birth of the empire, the Sol'Var returned and began the persecution that led to the war of two hundred years later, the war that killed two billion people, nearly a quarter of the Zandrian Empire. Many Shon'Var died in the first days of the rule of the Sol'Var High Priest. The rest went into hiding to bide time and draw from The Timepiece the strength evident in the long-distance killing perpetrated by the Sol'Var. Ninety seven years ago, they decided they would wait no more, and this was the beginning of the end for two billion, the Zandrian Civil War. Today, the Senate has been purged and the Shon'Var once again rule the Empire. I serve the Sol'Var church, but in name only. I have renounced the violence which I was never capable of in any event. Myself and two hundred of my brethren turned on the Sol'Var priesthood ten years ago and led them to defeat. They had forgotten how to rely on themselves for information and instead trained us as librarians of exceptional intellect and perfect recall. (I do not brag. It is a well-known fact.) But we could see only folly in forcing our beliefs upon another. We wished an end to the bloodshed, to the cacophony of disorder. Our price? We would share the throne. It was what we demanded, and honor binds the Shon'Var to keep the bargain. Today we see the dawning of a new era, of a new Senate, of the placement of a pair on the throne to serve the Senate and the people, even the masses in the fields and factories, as a Biumvirate Proconsul. Our protégé, Trevalin Delvana-a distant descendant of the Lady Liv-and Delta Stiev, the Marshall of the Shon'Var, a reserved woman of passing intellect and violent skill unmatched in the Empire today. They say she carries still the knife of my ancestor, though the blade has been replaced with Truewood. And the artisan guild? They carve their wood and they make their furniture and they fashion the genetically-engineered Timewood as they always have. They have developed exquisite new colorations, and they have become quite wealthy as a class. They exercise power in the Senate for the first time in memory. We shall have to watch them. |
Government: |
Quin City on the planet of Quin Jon is the nominal seat of government, but the Senate there is still reeling from the vast expenses incurred in fighting the Shon'Var. The real power is held by those who with a gesture can take it away, and so the real power resides at The Palace on Timeworld. The Senate has ruled Quin Jon since the death of the last Empress, but until recently also ruled the rest of Zandrian space. The Senate commands a large army which, although not on a level with the Deputtass, is well-armed and formidable. There is strong suspicion that a sizable group of the Sol'Var remain in hiding on Quin Jon, and the threat of a renewed full-scale war prevents the Shon'Var Marshall from excising more of the Senate's power. A purge would seem prudent, but also risky.
Laws are passed in the Senate and it is the first line of contact for anyone buying or selling anything within the empire. But they have no power to wage war or to set policies of trade, taxation, or foreign contact. All the real power rests with a co-consulate of the Shon'Var Marshall and The Sol'Var Adept. The Shon'Var have always had little love for money and the Senate serves as merchants and bankers. Within the system, the Shon'Var only need to state a need and friends come to fulfill it, like the palace I sit in, built by the Guild at no expense to the Shon'Var, with transportation of materials and craftspersons supplied by Quin City. The expense of our military fleets and our imports on Timeworld is taken in the form of heavy taxes on the merchant and patrician classes of Quin Jon. The government, like the church of the Shon'Var, is very flat. There is the Sol'Var Adept and the Shon'Var Marshall with her group of six Justices. >From there power is localized with individual cadre commanders and ship captains. Day to day life in The Palace is quite egalitarian: there are no servants among the Deputtass, although service tasks are performed by acolytes. Criminal law is administered at the local level for all but crimes of state. Execution for violent criminal offense is the norm, in combat with Deputtass. Crimes by Deputtass, including treason, are tried by the Seven Justices, and it is the duty of the Marshall to face state criminals on the killing floor, which has always been a sentence of death. Petty crimes are generally settled between disputants by either challenge of combat or, after trial in local council of Deputtass seniors, by ostracization and, in the case of Deputtass, loss of rank and even of citizenship. Problematic persons can be forbidden to carry weapons. The loss of status is considered the greatest penalty. For crimes against an individual, the victim can petition to have a mediated duel. That is, a member of the Deputtass acts as a referee for the fight. The victim of the incident must agree to this solution, though, or a more skilled criminal would be able to manipulate the outcome unfairly. Duels between disputants are held in arenas built specially for that purpose, and have become something of a spectator sport in Zandria. Though often fought to the death, there have been generous instances of mercy by the victor. While this system appears barbaric to many of our interstellar neighbors, we have a surprisingly low rate of crime within the empire. The individual's strong desire to keep his/her honor untainted has led to the construction of a stable, peaceful society -- despite our violent nature. Foreign Policy:“It is true that one can only truly negotiate from a position of strength, and preferably one of advantage. I say it is best, though, to negotiate with your blade on your opponent's throat. Then you can give without being taken, and you can take what you truly need of your enemy. My most loyal friends I have won with mercy on the killing floor.”
The Shon'Var have always dealt with an open hand in matters of state, openly and fairly. I do not boast this. They have learned the lesson we of the Sol'Var knew from our birth as an order: Chivalry is a grand gesture, but of little political worth in matters of state. Current foreign policy is still developing, and the Lady Delta Stiev is learning to keep one hand gloved and in her coat, even while extending the other to make a bargain. This is more in the tradition of our prophet. The combined influence of the two disciplines and the developing relationship between the co-consuls makes issues of foreign interaction somewhat unpredictable at this time. Domestic Policy:The government of my empire actually presents two faces to its people. The first is the face of a benevolent friend. The Shon'Var have always been protector of the weak, and it was their alliance with the people of Third World that made that the battlefield. Currently the people are still sided with the Shon'Var, with some torn loyalties toward the Sol'Var. The other side of the government's face is that of a spoiled and effete elite, a clan of a few hundred families who have milked Quin Jon for nearly fifteen hundred years. By sheer economic might, these Senatorial families exercise an undo influence over the people of Quin Jon. It was the Senate that housed and used the Sol'Var in an attempt to shackle the Shon'Var, and in the first years after the end of the war, many of these cancerous growths in our society were excised on the blades of silent Shon'Var patriots. Much is tolerated in The New Zandrian Order in terms of speech. The government takes little umbrage to the words and little notice of the press. We have no secret police, and yet our presence is everywhere. There is no interest in insurrection by the people and fear of the Shon'Var prevents open rebellion by the rulers of Quin Jon. Taxation of the working classes is nonexistent. All revenues are received via levies on business owners and the rich families of Quin Jon, through whom taxes and revenues flow from foreign trade. Individuality and the right to make personal choices are paramount in Zandrian society. Families and the loyalty to them are far more important to us than sexual mores. Artistic expression is guided by capitalistic principles: There is no state sponsorship of individual taste. Extended family is the hub around which our worlds revolve. The loyalties of familial ties are reinforced by allegiances and intermarriage. Children are never raised outside of the extended family, and many fathers marry Deputtass women, then stay home to raise children. Deputtass are 70% female and typically marry outside the Shon'Var. Our own Lady Delta Stiev is married to a playwright who keeps their apartments and raises their three daughters. (Travalin Delvana is not married.) There are two political groups of influence: The Shon'Var and the Senate. These have struggled for centuries and the Shon'Var have emerged as the victors, at least for this moment. The Shon'Var have little money and little interest in acquiring it-we take what we need from the Senate-and so have proven difficult to corrupt. |
Society: |
Languages:[No Information At This Time.] Religion:>From a society of tolerance, we have grown into one of a single religion: The Shon'Var Temple. My own people have been decimated, though it appears likely we survive in sheltered enclaves hidden my our masters, the rich families of Quin Jon. All Sol'Var temples have been destroyed, and only our library remains, as per the truce agreement. Attendance in the Shon'Var schools or adherence to Shon'Var religion is by no means compulsory. Education is not mandated at all, nor is religion. It is, however, so carefully woven into the fabric of our identity as a people that nearly all children are educated in the Shon'Var schools. Those who show the aptitude and who wish to do so attend the Deputtass Academy at Vatican City on Timeworld. There are fundamentalist groups who pursue a different path, and who run their own schools and worship in their own ways. They are under no threat of punitive action for doing so, and the war essentially sidestepped their agrarian and poor communities. Many of these communities have remained virtually unchanged for two millennia and inhabitants/adherents have developed in mysterious isolation. Castes:With the exception of the moneyed families of Quin Jon, a person's position in life, like one's vocation, are determined by the usual vagaries of genetic predisposition, talent, values, and fortune. The Lady Delta Stiev was born to farmer parents on Third World during the last days of the war and rose through ranks of Deputtass by virtue of innate abilities and acquired wisdom. The intransigent position of the relatively few individuals who exercise financial muscle is a thorn in the side of both the people and the Shon'Var. |
Economy: |
It is an unfortunate acknowledgment that the main export of Zandria has been, for a millennium, violence. Armies of mercenary knife -- and sword -- wielding soldiers have been sold to allies since the rise of the Senate. All who hire the arm of the Shon'Var have necessarily pled their case for the aid from the Shon'Var Marshall and the Senate, but the number of successful cases has given my people a violent name. More commonly has been the hiring-out of Shon'Var bodyguards, fanatically trustworthy Deputtass members, nearly invincible in one on one combat, and extraordinarily expensive. The third of Zandria's bloody exports is assassins, for whom a case must also be made to a Shon'Var counsel. If my people do one thing best, it is to deal death on the tip of a knife. I attempt to make no judgments on this. In Zandria, killing is a highly moral act.
The second major export of The New Zandrian order is the product of the Artisan Guild, novelties of beautiful Timewood. Furniture, jewelry, knife hilts, and art made of this mystical wood are all highly prized and widely collected, often in quiet circles. The Guild, as it has come to be known, has quietly cultivated a relationship with the invisible elite of many worlds. The same guild has genetically engineered Timewood to grow in myriad colors, always iridescent and deep. The ingenuity of the Guild's artisans appears boundless. Third among imports is a long list of chemical agents and raw resources, mined from an asteroid belt in the Mond/Timepiece system and from the gas giant Gypsy, around which circles the inhabited planet-sized moons of Third World and Triumph's Moon. Minor Exports are many--blades, crops steeped in the glow of the timepiece, the typical crafts, oils, liquors, and bric-a-brac that is sold in vendor stalls all over the universe. It is a trinket trade which, though not large in state revenue remains an untaxed, and therefore lucrative undertaking for working class families on Third World, especially families which produce no Shon'Var. |
Military: |
The virtual annihilation of the Sol'Var by the Deputtass thirty years ago left only one large-scale force in operation in Zandrian space, an army of three million young, aging, and elder supersoldiers known as the Shon'Var Deputtass. The Sol'Var, as you will read, were eliminated in a fell swoop ten years ago.
Weapons are pervasive in my society. They are carried by children and the aged that choose to age, and they are worn at nearly all times. The preferred weapon is the dagger, although short swords are commonly worn by Deputtass. Only the Shon'Var possess the finest of the weaponry: weapons fashioned for them by the guild and made of Truewood, grown on Timeworld only and carefully guarded. These weapons possess far greater power to channel the carrier wave than the wood grown on Quin Jon. Portable antennae for the Timepiece are found in Timewood, particularly in the Timewood grown on Timeworld, which is known as Truewood. Truewood grows for a century in the glow of The Timepiece and its ability to channel manna is many times greater than that of Timewood grown on Quin Jon. It is used by the Deputtass in body armor, in knife hilts and blades, and in religious talismans worn on necks, arms, and waists. Trunks of the living trees are used in the cores of Deputtass warships, and panels of Truewood make up their hulls. Timewood is stronger than most metals and can be made thin enough to be serviceable for such tasks. All weapons and armor of True Timewood are considered to be eventually the property of the Shon'Var. All the armor and weapons of a fallen Shon'Var are recovered, and the cost of such an effort is irrelevant. It has become common practice for an enemy to strip a Shon'Var and see personally to the return of his or her arms: If a body were left lying and bandits stole the armament, the Shon'Var charged with retrieving it would look to the killer. Shon'Var killed on other planets routinely have their armaments shipped back to Timeworld before my brothers need to go find them. Shon'Var also possess the only remaining ships with True Hulls, making them nearly impregnable within Zandrian space. The ships and the weapons of the Senate of Quin Jon are like the troops which comprise the militia there: they are clearly inferior. Hierarchy among the Shon'Var Deputtass is difficult to define. Always, since the days of Liv Zandross, there has been a Marshall of the Deputtass, the cleverest among killers. This office is currently held by a very young woman, Delta Stiev, whom it is my task to inform and sometimes instruct. Military authority is held in a manner similar to that of jurisdiction throughout the Empire (except on Quin Jon where it is centralized), which is to say that all power is local. Local commanders, ships' captains, and unattached Deputtass make decisions at the local level. Dissension is not an issue-loyalty to the Marshall directs these decisions. It is my belief and that of my brethren that this localized authority and allegiance made the Shon'Var an unconquerable enemy for my order. There was simply no heart for my masters to stab at. Military influence of the Sol'Var has been reduced to an advisory capacity. We supply information and a loyal populace from Third World. We supply the opportunity for long-range defense and attack should the need arise, although as weapons we are not as potent as our slaughtered masters. |
Sports and Leisure: |
There are two main pastimes among our people: violent sport and romantic theater. Arena fighting between professionals, for the most part non-lethal and fought both with and without weapons, draws crowds by the thousands.
Team sports abound at a recreational level as do skill sports that are purely for exercise, but the most popular team sport, with its stars and commensurate hyperbole, is Arena Ball, played by twelve Deputtass athletes per team, where the object is simply to place a six-inch Timewood ball through an eight-inch hole in the opponent's end of a 40 meter by 80 meter arena. There are no penalties and no weapons. When the ball touches the ground, play is suspended and resumed after the teams reassemble. The ball can move between teammates at velocities of 150 kilometers per hour. Deaths are infrequent but do happen and teams are made from members of the same graduating class from Vatican City. More than two hundred teams compete in a tournament played in Quin City during the holiday month that celebrates Zandross' birth. Arena Ball is the most widely viewed spectator sport. The rest of the year entertainment is provided by members of traveling thespian companies who present plays in large amphitheaters on romance topics from the great battles for unification under Zandross to family tableaus. My people are very romantic in their natures, and worship the ideal of knighthood represented by the best of the Shon'Var ideology. I do not claim that these are the principles in play at all times in society -- we have our reprobates, our criminals, our thieves and our liars, all in the expected abundances -- but as a society we idealize a more principled standard. Crass vulgarity is never presented in our theatres. |
Major Population Centers: |
Third World, although one third smaller than Quin Jon, possesses greater land mass and the water is very evenly distributed. Therefore it is the breadbasket of the empire and the home of 2/3 of Zandrian citizenry. It is also the poorest of the three main worlds, held in economic check by the merchants of Quin Jon and by the civil war, fought mostly on Third World.
Capital among its cities is Zandross, the original capitol of the Triumvirate mining colonies. Even this largest city could scarcely be called a city by galactic standards: it claims only three million inhabitants. As we are with our government and our authority, it is the nature of Zandrians to spread out, to reject centralization. Third World, like much of Quin Jon, is made up of thousands of villages and small towns, with local authority, local government, and local justice administered by senior Deputtass and enforced by junior Deputtass. The capitol of Timeworld is Shon'Var's Vatican City, a sprawling city of more than a million at any given time, although much of the population is transient. The centerpiece of this city is The Gateway, a palace made of pure Timewood, fitted and pegged with no modern construction methods, all of purple Truewood on the exterior and all colors of Truewood within. The spires of Gateway rise nearly 600 feet into the sky, carved by the Guild as a boon to the Shon'Var. In this place, from where I write these words, the pulse of The Timepiece is palpable. Here in our palace I suspect we are invincible. The thrum of God's eye pulses through the skin. Perhaps that is the real reason for my defection. Still, such issues are now irrelevant. Lastly I list for you the sprawling, grimy city of Quin Jon. Ten Million people stacked on top of each other, merchants and manufacturers and labor who inhabit the only industrial city in the Zandrian Order. Ten million souls living in crowded apartments while their masters live on sprawling estates for their use alone. Little grows on Quin Jon: the water is fouled by natural salinity and industrial runoff. In the center of Quin Jon, approachable by wide clean streets, sits the Senate House, from where rule the inhabitants of those country estates, the Senate of Zandria. Two billion people live on Quin Jon, and most of those live there to serve or to labor for members of Senatorial families. The people are spread out as their nature demands all over the New Order, but everywhere they are at the beck and call of the wealthy. As in other places, Zandrian social life is localized. But here that strong family tie is unraveling. |
Chronic Problems: |
Zandrian space is subject to three forces which have vied for control of our future for the 400 years since the birth of the Sol'Var. Only in the last century have these factions torn at each other's throats. The Senate of Quin has always passed its power through nepotism and patricianism. Even their robes of office stolen from history books. This favoritism among young politicals has led them astray of the path our prophet Zandross laid for them. After 15 centuries of inherited wealth and luxury without sacrifice, they have become less than their forebears. Quin city is, however, protected by its wealth and its merchant class, which is our link to the universe.
The senate, with their plebescent militias, have been at odds with the Shon'Var for a thousand years. The truce which destroyed my own heritage and temples also gave nominal control of Quin Jon to the Senate, although the teeth of its military were yanked. Quin Jon has no armed ships and no known offensive capabilities. It is heavily taxed by the Shon'Var to support our own defensive abilities. There is speculation among the Shon'Var that survivors of the Sol'Var are harbored by wealthy patrons on Quin Jon. While all the known temples of my people on Quin Jon were destroyed, the Shon'Var are not known for their record-keeping and there was no census taken of the dead. There are two kinds of poverty in Zandrian space. Most notable is the lack of resources available on Third World, with its population decimated and its infrastructure in waste. It has been ten years since the fighting ended and there have been no reported deaths by malnutrition in almost five. But the people, with the exception of the guild, lack in many necessities. But Quin Jon is poor as well, although there is enough to eat and wages are respectable. Quin Jon, and especially Quin City, is poor in spirit. Having lost the way of our ancestors, the people pursue the values of the Senate, diluted for mass consumption. They spend lavishly on homes and artwork and send their children to senatorial schools and less and less every year to Timeworld. There is a growing class of underprivileged on Quin Jon, though, that is largely ignored by the middle class and the Senate, and it is this group that is generally understood to be the future of the Shon'Var. There are millions of Quin Jon citizens who live on meager wages, who have too little to eat, and who cannot afford Senatorial education. Many of our recruits on Timeworld are from these working poor. They are proving the most talented of our young students, and their survival skills are sharp. At the apex of this empire, with its wealth and its five billion people, sit myself, a handful of Shon'Var Justices, Marshall Delta Stiev, and my pupil Trevalin Delvana. We have a common goal and some level of trust: we want to find a forward path for Zandrian society, for we fear that if we do not, the society and its marvelous accomplishments will die, whether at the hand of an enemy, or by simple social ennui. |
Submission Information: |
Submission Information:This is a co-colaboration
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