Empire Ascendant: Imperial Holdings of The Tytanyan Pact

THE TYTANYAN PACT: 

SAESUN, SMOLDER, ALBYON, & NUAR

A century and a half ago, the Isle of Saesun was gripped in a civil war between human kings. Their ancestors had come to the peaceful paradise isle as refugees. Out of mercy, the iaurdin convinced the sylvanar and the metallic dragons to let the humans settle until they could return back to the east. The humans settled and were allowed to use the lands as they wished as long as they respected the sacred groves of the sylvanar. The elves and dragons managed to keep the peace between the settlements as they developed into kingdoms. But perhaps it is in the nature of humans to quarrel. The humans began fighting over valuable resources, bickering over petty misunderstandings and creating war out of nothing. The metallic dragons picked sides and, after thousands of years of peace on Saesun, war broke out.

The elves tried to broker peace, they tried to abstain, but the men of Saesun began burning down their forests, killing their sacred animals, and escalating the war to greater heights. The sylvanar tried to intervene out of self-defense but brought the war home. The death of the sylvanar king, Opheros, was the final injustice that the iaurdin could not bear. Something had to change.

Since the beginning of the world, Saesun and the elves had been protected by powerful celestial runes that not only prevented invasion but helped keep many dangerous extra-dimensional threats from entering the world of Narya by force. Among these forces, were the chromatic dragons trapped since the Creation War. Queen Tytanya used her knowledge of the arcane to change the runes so that Red Typhon and his tyrant lords could enter Sublanarya through a gate she opened in Ryn-Durazar.

The following war was swift: the dwarves of Ryn-Durazar first endured devastating natural disasters caused by the gate opening and then were forced to abandon their homes under threat of dragon fire, then the iaurdin and the chromatic dragons forced the human kingdoms into submission, and the metallic were exterminated.

Ryn-Durazar became Smolder, the home of the chromatic dragons, and Saesun became the heart of the iaurdin empire. Together, they formed the Tytanyan Pact and the Tytanyan Age began. Over the next hundred years, they took complete control of the western seas of Sublanarya, colonized the island chain off the coast of Tazlan, and conquered the western kingdoms of Thule. The islands became Nuar and the kingdoms became Albyon.

Together these regions form an empire that have shaped the events of the last century in Sublanarya. But this realm is not merely an army of elves and dragons; it is a place of incredible natural beauty and home to the millions of citizens of the empire.

Iaurdin: Gods Save The Queen (The High Elves)

A long, long time ago, the elves were said to be one people.

They were the Iaur. They were descendants of the family of elf gods and gifted with a most beautiful, magical and protected home. The Isle of Saesun. They were guarded over by wise and powerful metallic dragons. They lived in a paradise free from strife or woes. They were innocent. They were children. Then, some of these children left home.

The children discovered evil. A few generations enslaved by the Naryan giants cut these elves off from nature, from whimsy and from innocence. In the hellish crucible of slavery, a blade was forged in the mines by an elven blacksmith. The blade was taken in the hands of the blacksmith's daughter. She used it in her escape from the Golden City, she wielded it in her duel with the Bjergfolk chieftain, and she raised it above her head when she led Bjergfolk back to the Golden City to free her people.

It is said that the blade has no magical qualities and is not beautiful to behold. It is a rather dull and uninspiring weapon. And yet, in the hands of the elven maiden, the blade forged by one in chains, the blade that broke the chains, the blade that freed a nation, the blade became legendary. Today, the blade hangs in the throne room of the Palace of Grand Saeffura on the wall behind the throne itself. The blade is called Chainbreaker.

The blacksmith's daughter became Queen Tytanya.

Queen Tytanya may be the most powerful mortal being in all of Sublanarya, if not Narya. After returning to Saesun, she was made queen of the iaurdin. The iaurdin are called "high elves" by themselves , "great elves" by their allies and "pointy ear bastards" by their enemies. And they have many enemies.

By allying themselves with the chromatic dragons to form the Tytanyan Pact, the iaurdin have become the most powerful empire in Sublanarya. From the Isle of Saesun in the Northwest to the conquered Thule territories, Albyon, to tropical colonies of Nuar in the South, the high elves ambitious expansion is impressive for such a contentious region. Viewed as invaders by their enemies, rebels sprouting up all along their outer territories, and held in contempt for their practices, the high elves are not well liked by other Sublanaryan factions. Their actions have caused great instability in the geopolitical landscape. And yet, the irony is that, within the borders of this empire, life is more stable than anywhere else in Sublanarya.

While the rest of the land sees them as conquerors, the iaurdin see themselves as saviors.

"So, what if the elves are the bad guys?"

This is probably a strange place to start but BARE WITH ME because I do get into some lore that, honestly, I find engaging:

I'm sure this isn't a completely and wholly original idea but that is where it started. The seeds for this dream started with binge watching Netflix. I had been watching a lot of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. 

 A major contribution of DS9 to the Star Trek Universe, in my opinion, was the exploration of the effects of colonization/resistance/revolution, etc.,  and the addition of species with more complex and deep cultures. Traditionally in Star Trek, each species could be soully defined by a single characteristics: Vulcans are logical and Klingons are warriors. DS9 introduced species with far more complex motives and persona that were harder to pin down while being more relatable and alien to humanity: the Cardassians and the collective species that make up the Dominion.

The Cardassians were very believable as an alien species because they were a dark mirror of humanity in the Trek verse. They shared a lot of personality traits but, collectively, chose a path of militarization and conquest. When confronted with the objectively morally superior Federation, the Cardassians are often forced to defend themselves as individuals and their entire culture. It is fascinating to see the mental gymnastics a Cardassian character has to go through to justify genocide and colonization. After all, they are basically Star Trek's equivalent to nazis.

The Dominion, on the other hand, catches my interest because of the interaction between a variety of species to create a complex hierarchy. They are lawful society, despite creating entire races for slavery and committing genocide against their enemies. Why? Because it is all justified under the auspices of creating a safer galaxy (mostly for themselves) and that is a fascinating motive for a species painted as antagonist. They are tyrants but, ultimately, they're selfishly benevolent tyrants and that is what I wanted to build upon.

So, I decided that in my setting, I wanted to re-purpose classic fantasy races to tell the stories this world is designed to tell, while remaining true to many of the core elements and themes of the species, but also evolving species into very interesting roles previously unexplored. After all, my fantasy settings tend to lean away from the medieval and more towards the Renaissance. I want to create a world that mirrors the "Age of Discovery".


With that in mind, we get to the question at the impetus of this setting's creation:

So, what if elves ARE the bad guys?