Holy Kingdom of Casary

The Holy Kingdom of Casary is a theocratic state located in eastern Mikana. At its height in the 3rd and 4th centuries AF it was the richest, largest and most powerful empire in the world. It was by far the most populous state in the world and its captial Dammdes is also the most populous city. It was founded in 168 AF by the Almancer Gan Bu'waila as the Holy Kingdom of Kubla. He then invaded Garmina, founding the famous cities of Si Fium and Dammdes and subjugating the kingdom. In the next 10 years, he conquered Socrais, Safolie, Corto, Visteu, Seringia, Moda, Gropis, Soforex, Kentrali and Pontilos, setting the modern boundaries for Casary. Today the kingdom offiicially controls barely 5% of its original territory, being ravaged by the ongoing civil war.

First Age
The lands now known as Casary became first inhabited around 5000 years BF. It was around this time that a sudden and mysterious burst of peoples from central Mikana occured. These people migrated in every direction, some of them settling in the Bungal peninsula, the first of Casary's lands to be settled. These first people farmed the land around the rivers of Bungal and established prosperous farming communities. Not much else is known of these first people as they did not leave much behind.

Second Age
After a few hundred years of prosperous farming, the first people were invaded by the Yndils, a warrior race originating from the mountains of Rudia. The Yndis subjugated the first people and established several centralized states in the process. The rulers of these states adopted the title of "king", a title that would become widely used in the coming years. Some evidence suggest that some of the first people escaped from the Yndis' wrath and migrated to the Sanol river-valley, making them the first people to settle in Casarian lands outside of Bungal. The Yndils ruled the Bungal for hundreds of years, warring with one in attempts to establish larger kingdoms. One of the Yndil kings succeeded in this, establishing the kingdom today known as Gropis, although then it was only one fifth of its modern area.

Third Age
Over the course of the hundreds of years that the Yndils lived in the Bungal peninsula, they had lost most of their warrior traits and adopted more "civilized" traits instead. So that is why that around 3000 BF most of the Yndil kingdoms were destroyed by Kracam peoples. The Kracams were not a warrior race like the Yndils once were, but ratherr a desperate people searching for good land to farm. All of the Yndil kingdoms in the northern half of Bungal were destroyed, but the southern kingdoms were united by the kingdom of Gropis, whose king launched a military campaign against the Kracams to retake their old lands. This conflict became known as the River war, for it much of it was fought on ships and boats in the rivers of Bungal. Both the Yndils and the Kracams suffered heavy casualties, and after 37 years of fighting a truce was negotiated. In the following peace treaty, the Yndils would get the southern half of Bungal, while the Kacams got the northern half. While the Yndils and Kracams were fighting in Bungal, more peoples migrated from both central Mikana and from other continents across the sea to the lands of Casary. The Socrai people migrated to Crossia from Panei and established their kingdoms there. To this day they still occupy that land.

Fourth Age
It was during this time that most of the states that make up modern Casary were formed. Konga was united as a single centralized state. Pontilos and Garmina were formed by settlers originating from central Mikana, and in the following years they expanded to become the largest and most powerful states in Casary. Kubla was also united after a great warrior from Garmina conquered the island with his warband. It was also during this age that the great dispute over the Talon peninsula started. The people known as Safolites, who are somewhat related to the Socrai, had settled in the peninsula hundreds of years prior, but from Ilnomica came a large group of peoples named "Corto". They settled on the western shores of Talon and quickly grew to expand into more land. The Corto invaded Safolie and took much of their lands, until the Safolites were united under the legendary warrior "Kairen". He lead the Safolites against the overwhelming numbers of the Corto and in a series of military victories he managed to have the Corto sue for peace due to their extreme exhaustion of the war. The boundaries were set for Corto lands and they had to pay huge tribute to Kairen and his new Kingdom of Safolie. The Corto people were enraged by their rulers decision to submit to the Safolites and revolted. Their king was toppled and the the rebels founded the Corto Republic. This form of government was very new to the world at the time, having only been used in Bysau before the Corto. This idea of people governing themselves resonated very well with the Kentrali, who against the huge states bordering them, formed the Kentrali Confederation, a union of independent tribes. The Kentrali became a great power, and were the foremost rivals of the Garminan Empire and Pontilos. In 70 AF Pontilos and Garmina joined forces to invade Kentrali and dissolve the confederation once and for all. Instead the Pontilos-Garmina army was crushed at the battle of Kuinos, where Kentrali horse archers played a key role. The Kentrali then turned the tide and invaded Pontilos, establishing a client state from its western territories named "Kuynem". They then invaded Garmina and raided its territories, even taking the large city of Handon. In 73 AF the Kentrali finally accepted peace from Garmina and Pontilos, after being offered a substantial amount of gold in tribute. Though Garmina managed to recover from the war, Pontilos was forever after this reduced to a secondary power.

Fifth age
After the Kentrali war, the states of Casary were at relative peace for almost 80 years. Although there were minor conflicts fought occasionally, there was not a major war in many years. Until in 159 AF when Yderian Kilsof ascended to the throne of Garmina. A militaristic ruler, he invaded the kingdom of Safolie along with the Republic of Corto. Safolie was crushed and split between Garmina and Corto, sparking alarms throughout Casary an beyond. Even Pontilos, Garminas faithful ally denounced the act as warmongering. Unmoved by this, Kilsof invaded the Bungal peninsula, taking Visteu almost without resistance and defeating the Seringian army in just one month. The states of Casary would not tolerate this aggression, and almost all of them declared war on Garmina, with the exception of Konga. Kilsof had to withdraw from Seringia to face the large Kentrali armies marching to his western borders, and he was all but powerless to the Pontilos armies coming from the north and the Socrai armies from the south. The Garminan armies put up a good fight against the invaders, Kilsof even managed to completely repel the Kentrali invasion, allowing him to turn his attention towards the Pontilos armies. After several years of fighting, Garmina was severely battered from the fighting, and the invading kingdoms had all suffered heavy casualties. In 168 AF a man by the name of Gan Bu'waila seized control of the island of Kubla through his army of religious followers, declaring a "holy kingdom". His intervention in the war would change the world forever.

Holy Kingdom of Kubla
Gan Bu'waila was and Almancer born around 500 BF, being the 3rd and most recent Almancer in recorded history. In the time he was born, an upper class of Garminans had ruled Kubla for over 200 years, who ruled the island with an iron fist. His parents were killed in one of the Garminan's "purges", trying to lessen the population of the natives. So he grew up on the streets of Sturnfa, Kubla's largest city, having no clue of his powers. For 300 years he traveled over Kubla, discovering somewhere along the way of his true power, yet not embracing them. Some scholars believe that he was afraid of his powers, at girst rejecting them entirely. He then decided to leave Kubla and traveled all over the world, going as far as Seria in Dovan. One of the places he visited was Jumajala, the holy city of the Karputs. He was very fascinated by the Karput religion, the Jordoxic faith, most historians in Erinia agree that this is where he got the ideas on which he based his own religion, Huanism. After this he returned to Sturnfa and began preaching the word of god. He convinced many to convert by showing them his powers as an Almancer, although they were limited they were still greater than that of any normal psychic. He quickly gained a loyal following, and in 167 AF, he took control of the entire city, founding the Holy Kingdom of Kubla, though most scholars would rather recognize the date 168 AF, for when Gan took control of all of Kubla.

Conquest of Garmina
After consolidating his control over Kubla, he saw that Garmina was weak after fighting in the 10 years' war, and decided to invade, stating that is was to "spread the word of god". He landed between the two towns of Sium and Find, founding a settlement there and declaring it a "holy site". The settlement would later grow to encompass both Find and Sium, being renamed Si Fium. He marched with his relatively small army of 10,000 to besiege Xamandes, the captial of Garmina. During the 5 month siege, he recruited as many as 7000 peasants into his army from the surrounding area by preaching to them and showing his powers, which were getting increasingly more powerful. After the city surrendered, he also declared it a holy site, and made it his temporary base of operations. Emperor Yderian Kilsof of Garmina was furious when he heard of this, marching from Corto after brokering peace with them. He rallied an army that some scholars say went up to 100,000 in size, although a more realistic assumption would be around 30,000. He attacked Gan's army of 22,000 at Haldern fields, who had been preparing his defence against Kilsof's army. The battle of Haldern Fields was a bloody one, with both sides suffering heavy casualties. In one moment, Kilsof personally lead a cavalry charge at Gan's flank, hoping it would break the army. Gan knew it was lost if Kilsof carried out the attack, so he used his powers to cause a rock avalanche from a nearby mountain, crushing Kilsof and all of his cavalry, but also killing a large number of his own men. The battle ended in a phyrric victory for Gan, but with Kilsof dead, the rest of Garmina would fall easily. He marched to Dammdes, the second largest city in Garmina, and took it without any resistance. He loved the city so much that he decided to make it his new capital, declaring it "the holiest city of them all", and declaring lake Damdos "the sacred waters". This is also when the Holy Kingdom of Kubla became the Holy Kingdom of Casary.

Conquest of Casary
The other states were alarmed at Gan's conquest of Garmia, but none of them rushed to actions against him. Over 2 years he consolidated his control over the region and funded constructions in Dammdes. He also supported the Agram order and spread his religion to all corners of his new empire, persecuting all those he considered heretics. But he never planned on stopping his conquests with just Garmina. In 171 AF, he sent a medium sized army to conquer the Socrais kingdoms, but keeping the rest of his army at Dammdes. One after the other, the Socrais kingdoms fell. The invading army committed many atrocities during their campaign, especially in the Solemeni kingdom, where entire settlements were wiped out. This invasion, coupled with Gan's attitude towards those who did not follow his religion, which the other Casarian states did not, caused them to band together yet again. In 172 AF, Seringia, Visteu, Gropis, Pontilos, Kentrali and Corto all declared war upon the Holy Kingdom, with support from Magney, Rudia, Konga and Yurgana. Gan immediately marched with his force of 70,000 men to Corto, in order to secure his southern border. The Corto republic didn't even last a month against Gan's immense power and his fanatically devoted soldiers. The Safolites, who had been conquered by the Corto a decade ago, offered Gan military help against the Corto if they in return got their guaranteed independance. Gan agreed, but when he had conquered the Corto, he immediately conquered the Safolites as well. He exterminated numerous settlements in the southern part of the Talon peninsula, ensuring that there would be no revolt while he dealt with the other states. He didn't have to march far, as the united Casarian army consisting of all the states of Casary prepared to destroy Gan's army. The coalition army may have numbered up to 250,000 men, facing against Gan's 70,000. The two armies fought near a village called Peltsbur, and so the battle came to be called the battle of Peltsbur. Despite being heaily outnumbered, the royal army crushed the coalition army, largely due to Gan's now almost limitless powers. Some accounts say that Gan opened a giant rift in the ground under the enemy army as they charged at him. Gan lost around 10,000 soldiers, while the coalition casualties numbered around 210,000. After this crushing defeat, the Casarian states lost all hope. Many considered surrendering themselves to Gan, as to spare them from his wrath. The king of Visteu decided to fight, and for this Gan set an example to the other states. He massacred around 400,000 Visteuans, which was around 50% of their entire population. In fear that he might give them the same fate, Seringia, Gropis and Pontilos all surrendered. The only state that was left fighting was Kentrali, which still had a powerful military. Gan's invasion of Kentrali was so brutal, so visceral and genocidal that many of his soldiers began to doubt their faith. The population of Kentrali before the invasion was around 6,000,000. After Gan left the country with his army, around 40,000 were still alive. Gan would sometimes burn entire settlements with his powers, or simply let the ground swallow them. To this day the area formely known as Kentrali is by far the least populated area of Casary. Gan even later admitted himself that he regretted many of the things he did to the Kentrali. But with the defeat of the Kentrali, Gan had defeated all the states that had dared oppose him, and his was the largest and richest empire in the world.

Golden Age
Gan's conquests may have initially brought death and destruction to Casary, but after the conquests Casary entered an era of great peace and prosperity. Huanism was spread throughout most of the kingdom, though areas that were especially devastated from the conquests mostly rejected the religion. Gan did not persecute them, for they were still a large portion of the people in his kingdom, and he wanted every region to rebuild and prosper, not to revolt. The Agram order also prospered during this time, expanding to Yurgana, Konga, Infermia, Panei and Rudia. Although they would lose their holdings in Rudia very soon due to the anti-Casary fervor there, and later in Infermia due to Amuna the great's conquests. The population if the kingdom also grew exponentially. Going from a already conciderably populous 60 million, to a staggering 230 million. The population would later reach its height at 420 million right before the civil war.