Aloria Story Progression Tension Never Truly Abates In This World

[MonMarty]

((A test run for a new progression format. Less fancy and RP-like written, more to the point, but also adding a lot of random other progression from around the world. This format balances keeping the information short and concise, while also allowing extra time and energy to provide more news from around the world than just the Regalian Empire as a trade-off.))

News in the Archipelago

• House Viduggla attempts to garner support among the Skagger Elders by attempting diplomacy through the Elders and the Zastorzy family. However, their attempts run on empty, providing a pittance of finances, while Garth's face is also badly bruised by one of the Great Three's Huscarls, a bald man named Olaf, the Elders offended by this non warrior attempting to become one of the Great Three.
• House d'Vaud repairs negative relations with House Kade with a numer of gifts totalling 2500 Regals and succeeds well.
• House Miramonte supplies House Black with 1000 Regals worth of repairs funding.
• House du Pont soldiers cross the borders of House Lampero lands, raiding small Lampero villages on the borderlands. Before local troops can respond however, the looters are gone.
• Days after the du Pont attacks on Lampero soldiers, reports surface from the Regalian slums that Half-Orc fighters attack Hightowers on patrol, and even once attempt to assault the Slum gate, though fail to make grounds.
• House du Pont pays 5,000 Regals for Hadrian's wall to house Typhonus.
• House du Pont pays 5,000 Regals to House dei Orazio with no clear cause.
• House Harhold sends a marriage offer to House van Dirkse, which is unfortunately rejected. House van Dirkse states that while gifts are appreciated, Harhol'd lineage is murky and unclear, and deemed unsuitable breeding stock for old noble houses.
• House Howlester contributes another 5,000 Regals to Hadrian's wall.
• House du Lioc hosts a grand military parade with open invitations to Lady Peirgarten (who probably was there?) and Percival Ravenstad, who refused to attend citing some vague irritation over du Lioc's abandonment of the family standard. The grand parade was incredibly costly, counting 4,000 regals, certainly outdoing du Pont in splendour. While this doesn't reach much in Brissiaud itself, it ends up tempering good relations between du Pont and di Alan, the latter who now seems to favor du Lioc more.
• ((House Carwell's alignment with the Kingdom of Magnanimus remains unregistered since the Great House of Magnanimus has failed to pass lore canonization and as such is not part of Regalian lore)).
• House Harhold funds House Black with another 5,000 Regals to restore Narlas.
• House Black funds another 3,000 Regals for the final reconstruction of Narlas, completing the rebuilding of the last burnt out housing and restoring the last wall segments that were destroyed. The Narlas city itself is now largely restored, and what remains is just private enterprises, thanks to the help of all the other funders.

News from Ithania

• Genevieve Howlester sends a troupe of artists and musicians to the Ithanian Sovereign. While the Sovereign is enthused about the music making, the effects of this pr stunt are blunted by the absence of care in the Regalian state towards Ithanian rights and policies, as well as general resentment towards the declining state of Ithanian relevance in Regalian politics.

News from the War Front

• The intial waves of Kade led attacks against the Elves are largely a draw, however a beach head is created to allow future assaults. Among the well performing members in the war are Reyes Velasquez, Cro-Zzhin Yaotl, Sonja Apoleno and Otto Bergmann. Gloriously so, Ardige Viduggla leads as general to capture the only fort that the Kade led forces managed to take, securing the foothold that the Empire so badly needed to try the fourth invasion of the Elven lands after three failures.

News from the Slums

• After a lengthy protracted battle overseen by the Prime, Sloan Perrot is declared the first Great Wolf of the First Pack. In the first round, Rodolphe the masked man, Jaak Perrot and Sloan Perrot defeat seven other contestants. In the second round, Jaak Perrot and Sloan Perrot remain. In the third round, Sloan Perrot defeats his son and is transformed into a Hellion Great Wolf.

News from the Dragon Knights

• Mordred Howlester, Barrulf Blackmyre, Reinhardt Alschultz, Marissa Morgan, Deo dei Termini, Wyland of Framlingham and Fawzi Kra'zzla try-out for the Dragon Knight order against Cedric Kade, Tristan Kade and Nathan Kade. In a set total of 10 rounds, the commander takes the win on 6 of them, Nathan Kade takes two, Mordred Howlester & Barrulf Blackmyre both take one (thus securing their entry into the Dragon Knights Order). The others all fail to take a single round, while Deo dei Termini is eliminated in round 4 while all others make it to round 10, breaking his right arm, two fingers on his left hand, and bruising three ribs badly as a result of the harsh combat between the contestants, and is told to leave the fighting to actual warriors, and go back to his toy soldiers.
• Rumor starts circulating that since the ascension of Unionism event, the ex-Emperor appeared to no longer be able to shape shift into a Dragon form. While no official news has been brought out, some people are drawing conclusions since the eerie absence of a Dragon since that very event, and fear the potential military ramifications, losing such a powerful tool so quickly before it could properly be used to benefit the Empire.

News from Elsewhere

• In Farahdeen, on the cross border of Al-Alus, Mooriyye and the Songaskian Masaya, rumors spread that a giant clockwork golem has started marching into the old ruins of the Sariyd Empire and killing dozens of Songaskian townships along the way. The Qadir seem to hide something, while the Regalian authorities attempt to suppress any information or rumor in the capital to this subject.
• Also from Farah'deen, rumors are circulated that one of the southern coast provinces has suddenly become infested with Hellion footmen and Great Wolves slaughtering hundreds of Songaskians and sending the rest further north to the interior. The heavy concentration around the Saliq valley implies this is their base of operations.
• Border skirmishes occur between the Sendrassian Allar and the Hadarian Allar. It is unclear who started, but several naval taunting sessions have been reported on the Slithering Sea between the two land masses, and some casualties have been made on both sides.
• The Dread Empire appears to be celebrating the festival of Tolöst, having selected a number of so called exalted generals who are expected to lead the invasion of the Elven lands. While some Dread Empire armies already operate on the mainland, the main invasion is expected to arrive within the coming weeks.
• In Fendarfelle, a colonial conflict between an number of colonial charters has seriously threatened the beaver exports, and thus the export produce of pelts. In Regalia, the price of beaver pelts skyrockets and numerous clothing businesses experience extreme difficulty satisfying the demands of the nobility.
• The Orcs of the Black Iron tribe appear to have developed strange metal machines powered by Orc Muscle and Black Powder that are capable of receiving direct artillery fire and shrugging it off. Calling them the upside down kettles, the Orcs have starrted using these machines to march into the Avanthar Hortutor lands. The Avanthar, still embroiled in a massive civil war, suffer massive casualties from the new Orc tactic, which is capable of penetrating deep into Avanthar lands and resisting any attempt of the Avanthar to use asymmetrical warfare with arrows on the metal machinery of the Orcs.
• Also among the Avanthar, thousands upon thousands of Avanthar are enslaved by the Orcs and brought back to the Black Iron Tribelands. There is even rumor among the traders outbound to Regalia that he Black Iron Tribes are considering unifying the clans properly under one they call the Great Fist of Tarq, to invade the Red Blood Tribelands and unify the Orc hordes once more like they were in the old days during the invasion of the Elven Empire.
• In the far north, the Mirnoye seem to finally encroach out of their isolation. The ill fated attempt of the Kostalansky family to send missionaries to the island seemed to have caused a shift in the Mirnoye, especially since the missionary transport was in violation of the ceasefire between Regalian and the Mirnoye people. The Mirnoye however appear to be moving north to invade the Velheimer kingdoms, and not south, to Nordskag which is part of the Regalian Empire.
• In Ellador itself, the siege of Alduin seems to be lifted, giving the Dwarves who remained to defend their stronghold a breather, and the Isldar retreat from their offensive beyond Grebor. While the exact reason is unclear, the Isldar seem to be shifting their armies around to strengthen the core instead of striking outwards. The lack of troop garrisons in the Ostryll colonies however increases tension with the local Velheim warlords, who see their opportunity to expand their taxes by annexing the Isldar colonists. While no violence has occured yet, the situation appeared extremely tense.

 

[EndersGameboy]

Hearing about the golem Rampaging throughout the ruins of the Sariyd Empire, Beni Yahdga would slam open his notebook and jot a reminder down to bring this to his next meeting with the others in his Department of the Scholar Ministry.

 

[Anseran]

Sonja Apoleno partied even more gloriously than how he fought, with his lads; crew and all, joining him in song throughout the night in pure camaraderie.

 

[Yoggery]

Gunther Winterhart would've heard this news by word of mouth most likely, not being able to read the local news papers. He'd head into whatever spot he can sleep somewhat peacefully for the night, and mutter before falling asleep in Alt-Regalian, "Those poor Avanthars."