Difference between revisions of "Ter-Fiinokth"

Revision as of 21:40, 21 August 2007

Claimant: Icebreed

Ter-Fiinokth is an average-sized province of the Drovinian Reaches, the D'hennexian country of the undead. In its throne sits the most unusual death-conqueror of them all: Kalar Baen. In the clinging image of his living imagination, he has shaped Ter-Fiinokth, and so made it just as odd as he is.

Geography

Ter-Fiinokth is a landlocked, northeastern territory, and is one of those that border An-Yneaith. Of all the undead lands, it is perhaps the one with the most "human" influence upon the borders. Where others lurk in murky lakes, magically sundered terrains, and frozen mountain peaks, Kalar Baen's sovereignty covers the most hospitable and best preserved terrain in the country. Parts of Verdrode Koude's mountain range's northernmost reaches lie in the South, running rivers delineate much of its western and eastern borders, and a significant chunk of its northern half consists of everglades and pine forests.

For this very reason, Ter-Fiinokth often takes the brunt of Human assaults from the North. The territory is lusted after by the living for its natural resources, tactical positioning amongst other Drovinian provinces, and accessibility. Where the other Kalars have made sure to make the northern countries hesitant to settle near the borders, border raids from Ter-Fiinokth are lower than anywhere else along the line, and at least one significant keep sits just 15 miles north of it, along one of the rivers that runs straight across its eastern border. Its continued existence has been a subject of loathing upon Kalar Baen from the other Kalars, since they are forced to help him reinforce his own country against the Humans when they garrison (lest they fall with him on the attack), yet cannot make a strong move against it without risking a flanking assault from Ter-Fiinokth.

While it may be difficult, at first, to discern Ter-Fiinokthan territory from northern countries, the borderline itself is generally unmistakable; its current position is unerrantly drawn across the land in a black and red stain, where the uncomfortably united undead hordes have been less than delicate with generations of living invaders.

Leadership and Law

As previously stated, Kalar Baen rules ultimately over Ter-Fiinokth. He claims to hold regular council with several "senator generals" to discuss matters of state and strategy, but any who understand the nature of the Kalar and his territory also understand that his senate is merely a weakly veiled, undead puppet show. They are largely yes-men, and any who speak out against the Kalar's wishes in council only do so in a farce to demonstrate Baen's value of free expression. His opinion is always the only one that matters, even if it is not immediately apparent that it was his in the first place.

Such mock leadership and freedom are mirrored throughout the single, large settlement that acts as Ter-Fiinokth's capital. It's citizens speak only the praises of Kalar Baen, and everything else the demented undead knight programs them to. In such a city, there is no need for law enforcement, for Baen's will constantly, invisibly enforces their behavior, at all times.

To make things even more unusual and confusing, the Kalar often permits handfuls of living people to reside within the northernmost reaches of the country, in small hamlets and towns, alongside hopelessly larger numbers of his own undead citizens. As living creatures, they are not bound strictly by the magical whims of the knight-lord, but instead, they must live by several cheery, yet suffocatingly creepy laws that work nearly as well:

1. You shall be happy.
2. You shall be happy that Kalar Baen is your lord.
3. You shall be happy to do exactly as the Kalar wishes.
4. You shall be happy that Kalar Baen has allowed you to live free.
5. You shall be happy to know all fellow Ter-Fiinokthans as comrades.
6. You shall be happy to stay in Ter-Fiinokth forever.
7. And if, for any reason, you are unhappy, you shall be happy to lay down your life for land and lord, that you might be happy again.

Oddly enough, there are several (admittedly odd) living people in the country who honestly enjoy the "life" they have been "given" there. Regardless, some of the living who dwell in Ter-Fiinokth are even sometimes forced into defending the land, cunningly confounding the invaders, who usually drive south with some sort of "zombie hunting" mindset. Defectors in battle are detected quickly, and treated with greater malice and murderous intent than the true enemy.

Constituency and Culture

90% of Ter-Fiinokth's populace is undead: not a surprising statistic. What does tend to surprise outsiders is that the vast majority of the undead constituents are not only perfectly preserved and completely whole, but intricately animated, such that blood seems to pump in their veins, bringing color to their skin again. They even usually have lively and warm "personalities", but when one stays in their company for very long, one begins to realize that their minds are dead, their souls departed, and their animations are nothing but a long cycle of patterened, programmed behavior. They do not recognize people they have met before, and by proxy, they never build friendships or relationships. Although they become mildly cross if someone tries to hurt them, abuse them, or say mean things to them, their responses to such are practically robotic and almost never turn to retaliation, except in extreme circumstances. They also seem to actively discourage dishonorable acts, regardless of the subject -- though this is more verbal than anything. Of course, Kalar Baen is above any programmed moral, as all that he does is automatically right. He can cleave one of his own people in twain, in public, and the rest of them will give him a rousing round of applause, for it was obviously somehow well-deserved, and done masterfully, to boot.

The only thing that can truly incense them is to act out against the Kalar or his "people", either verbally or otherwise. To destroy one of them is to incite its entire village to arms. To say that the Kalar is a tyrant is to form your own lynch mob. Attack a town, and the entire region responds, quicker than it would seem possible. Attack the Kalar himself, and you permanently and spitefully forge yourself into the minds of every undead creature in Baen's province, becoming one of the very, very few who they remember with a passion -- that is, if you manage to survive the ordeal.

Other than verbally, both undead and living residents perform routine busy-work, tending to the land, and maintaining farce utopias. There is no currency in the land, but neither are there businesses, except for farce ones that exist only for show. The living are directly and hesitantly provided for with the least conditions available that can keep them healthy and alive, sometimes meaning they must eat rats and bugs for sustenance, and drink from wild streams. Their shelters are often the smallest buildings in the towns, as the undead do not require such maintenance and care. Instead, they stay up and perform their duties day and night, sometimes performing entire programmed plays in houses and plazas for nobody at all but the distant Kalar. In the capital itself, and especially close to the enormous castle where Baen keeps his throne, thralls labor to keep things spotless for their lord. They sweep roads free of dirt, clean windows until one cannot see them for the air, paint walls every other week, and buff his weapons and armor to a brilliant shine, whispering pre-planned whinnies of elation for the "priveledge" of serving their lord directly.

To summarize, briefly: Ter-Fiinokth is Kalar Baen's personal, hobby-like fantasy world.

Cities and Landmarks

Fal-Baenim

There is only one major city in Ter-Fiinokth: its grand capital city, Fal-Baenim. At any given time, the city-state has between half a million and a million super-zombies working diligently on keeping their "home" as clean and perfect as it was when it was first created. However, as certain scheduled tasks aggregate, as many as two million can be counted milling about, offering empty cheers to one another and telling nobody at all about how wonderful their Kalar is. Thus, it is believed that despite the appearance of civilization that Baen has tried to maintain, many of his creations still lurk in the wilds, in unseen places.

Fal-Baenim is a fortress city to rival all others; its walls have several layers of thickness, and its ramparts project more than two hundred feet into the air. Unlike many of the world's defensive establishments, this city has been specifically designed for optimal defense from all perceivable entry points; wide pillars project up higher than the outlying parapets from the middle of the city proper, acting as archer and wizard platforms to assault foes attacking from above. The foundations of the entire city have been walled up as obsessively as the outsides, and are just as patrolled, dissuading the habitual underground attack of other undead forces. Castle Baenim, at the very center of the city, is a respectable fortress unto itself, designed with similar ideals as the rest of the city. In addition, a powerful magical ward has been put into place, preventing powerful enemy spellcasters and psions from teleporting too close. A final note about Fal-Baenim's defensibility: the Kalar has gone through great pains to ensure that none of the buildings, defenses, or other establishments throughout his capital city are flammable; invaders attempting to set it aflame will find their efforts most significantly hindered.

Castle Baenim

Castle Baenim, nestled securely within Fal-Baenim's protective walls and fortifications, is where Kalar Baen sits at his throne, and holds his mock senate. In contrast to almost the entire remainder of his lands, the castle has been made an epitome of military readiness and vigilance. Tens of thousands of heavily armored zombies, under his strict control, patrol the castle's walls and execute needless day-and-night-long training drills and exercises. Counter-siege weapons are tested on a daily basis, sometimes directly into Fal-Baenim proper, just to ensure their continued effectiveness. The repair work gives the undead something to do, anyway.

The Relic of Kjemrhil'lah

At the very center of Ter-Fiinokth, where the evergreen forests are especially thick and wooded, lies a place of great and grim mystery. It is theorized that there is an immense, underground dungeon located here, where Kalar Baen keeps his captured, living foes. None who live and enter have been seen to leave still living. From what has been observed, it is likely that some relic of extreme magical power lies here, augmenting the Kalar's own necromantic magics and enabling him to create and maintain his numerous, remarkably life-like zombie legions. Every so often, a powerful spiritual pulse erupts from the area, sufficiently potent to sweep entirely across Ter-Fiinokth. Some have noted that where the undead might have seemed a little more sluggish than usual one day, they immediately are restored to livelihood in the next, once the pulse passes through.

Army

As with most of the other undead armies of Drovinia, it is impossible for anyone but Kalar Baen to speak of how many undead soldiers he has under his command. His horde has been gathered since ancient times, when the Kalar himself descended into undeath, and there are doubtlessly many, many more at his command than what parades in villages and trains in his castle. What can be described, however, is the nature of his army.

Unlike his villagers and show troops, the mass of Baen's army is skeletal. Little to no effort has been made to preserve them, except for the important detail that they have all four limbs (skeletal or otherwise), since the undead do not draw strength from muscles as the living do. Rather, the complex animous energies siphoned into the soldiers tends to bolster their skill in battle. Knowledge of all manner of weapons and their use in combat has been directly drawn from Kalar Baen himself, and instilled, to varying degrees, in his offensive minions. While typically no more durable than the next territory's skeleton or zombie, the black knight's forces are often sufficiently skilled with their selected weaponry that the weapons of the living rarely touch them. They frequently work exceedingly well as a group, as they receive the Kalar's extensive military unit experience. The weapons and armor are especially crafted by a full-time manufacturing line of blacksmith zombies, who, though seemingly simply preserved and programmed like the rest of his villagers, have been invisibly bound to the souls of the best dead craftsmen of the times. The greatest of the Kalar's thralls are, more often than not, equipped with magically enhanced equipment that further indemnify those who would stand against them.

Aside from the skeletons, the super-preserved zombies are often brought into battle, on the defense. These unlikely warriors, from infants to barmaids to the elderly, are almost always skilled archers, as this places them in the least amount of danger from combat; The Kalar is especially protective of them, and does not hesitate to withdraw them when they draw enemy aggression.

The living who are drafted into military service are nearly always placed at the front of the front lines. Not only does this maximize the confusion factor they sow on the battlefield, but it also nearly always ensures that they will die -- if not by enemy hands, then "legally" by their own army's hands, since treachery and deserting in battle are causes for an immediate death sentence.

Occasionally, desperate or important battles with Kalar Baen's army will see the arrival of freak, mutant zombies that have been blown out of proportion by the master's twisted, shaping hand. They wield massive weapons, have bulging muscles, and can shrug off almost any wound. These are usually the results of botched experiments in zombiecrafting; if there is a point to the Kalar's endless hobbymaking, it is to create the perfect zombie knight. Strong and fast, durable and smart, skilled and deadly, utterly unstoppable: Most believe that Baen will not stop in his insane work until he has created something that can equal or best him, in battle ... and yet, looks absolutely gorgeous. Yes, gorgeous. The experiments are almost always decidedly female. Regardless, it is well known that in the meantime, Kalar Baen regularly competes with the neighboring Kalar, who is a master necro-mechanic. Baen makes massive, fleshy monsters. {Placeholder} makes ravenous, titanic machines. The two make bloody, oily messes as they spill eachother's innards in border conflicts, where both types of creature are unerringly present.

Foreign Policy

Though plagued from conflict and hate on all sides, Ter-Fiinokth holds special spite for An-Yneaith. So long ago, Kalar Baen was cheated from the country's throne. Now that he has his own throne to sit in, he enjoys considering rather diluted, brute-force plans on storming the northern country and forcefully taking the crown back for himself. Generally speaking, though, Ter-Fiinokth plays far more defense than offense. As such, Kalar Baen is skilled in negotiations, mostly with his fellow undead countries. While they certainly don't like him, nor mind raiding his territory now and then, they are rarely so focused in spite as to send full attacks against his territory. Baen frequently has them too tied up in the politics of undeath through subtle sabotage and intrigues.

If there is one territory he is friendly to, however, it is Kar Ellar Sumn. While no direct relations exist between them, Baen rarely tries to undercut the female Kalar, and frequently uses her to take advantage of other Kalars' created weaknesses. Whether it is some lingering tendency to romance in the knight-lord's unnaturally beating heart or something deeper and more insidious, none can tell.

History

Under construction.