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PostPosted: Wed Dec 26, 2012 10:57 pm 
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The Mirelands
Geography
The Mirelands are dominated primarily by their namesake: the Greatmire, an immense stretch of swamp that extends from nearly coast to coast, straddling the great grass river that flows through the country. The Greatmire exists as a valley between the mountainous south and north, and becomes considerably more barren as it extends towards the eastern reaches of the Mirelands.

The eastern bay tends to consist of rocky marshes and stretches of peat-bog that extend for miles, with villages on stilts along the ocean’s edge. These coastal regions are policed by a small fleet of grass-cutter ships, sailboats that can traverse the swamps with ease. The North-Eastern islands, the Ice-Keys, tend to stay relatively frigid with long winters and short, dry summers. The South-Eastern area is a hub of production and the location of the only proper forests in the country, vast rising stretches of bamboo forest which dot craggy mountainsides.

The southern and northern borders are lined with cliffs and plateaus with a few mountain-pass roads.

Ecology
Whereas cattle has been imported and fish and eel provide plenty of protein along with water fowl, most of the Mireland's great beasts are immense insects. Pack-mules are quaint in the face of great armored beetles that carry military supplies and act as primitive tanks. Great mantises act as mounts for worksite overseers. All manner of giant insects have attempted to prey on the locals, and have been tamed; a longstanding symbol of nezumi resilience.

The most rare are the great silk moths, reserved as mounts for emissaries of Cinder-Fur and the two ninja clans. Able to fly in absolute silence, they have been known to drop bombs that their riders crudely tie to their bellies onto bandit camps and foreign caravans. As for ground mounts, stag beetles are popular choices, though larger traveling groups have even employed great centipedes.

Disease is not unknown to the nezumi and is quite common even among locals, though usually through wound infections from the swamps. A great plague struck the nezumi people shortly after the establishment of Cinder-Fur’s power, and the country has finally shaken off most of its damage, though sometimes nezumi are still stricken with the airborne disease.

Populated Environments and Notable Architecture
The Supreme Wall
Spanning the Mirelands’ borders from the northern extreme all the way to the south, the Supreme wall is a feat of engineering prowess much unrivaled around the world. Demonstrating both the nezumi mastery of their home terrain, but also of their magnificent workmanship, the wall is constructed of solid stone blocks arranged to form the wall. The wall stands at an unflinching height of sixty feet from the highest ground level in contact with its base, the wall ranges anywhere from twenty-five feet wide at the main wall sections, to over sixty feet wide at the included barracks and artillery platforms.

Though foreigners cannot tell the difference, the wall has been undergoing an extensive retrofitting process since the Gunpowder Revolution, fortified with internal insertions of solid steel plate and girders, and the expansion of the barracks to house massive rocket-brigades that can engage both airborne and ground targets with mass retaliation. The wall is staffed by a large body of the Mirelands’ typical standing army, and the two non-ninja clans oftentimes supply personnel to station particular sections when the army would prefer extra fortification.

Black-Rock Citadel and City
Though the name itself refers to the monolithic and extravagant palace the former emperor and his ilk resided in (and that Cinder-Fur now uses as his seat of power), Black-Rock has also extended its name to the bustling urban center that has sprung up around the fortress palace. Built out of one of the many lonely mountains that pop up periodically throughout the central mires, Black-Rock sprawls out in all directions from the citadel, boxed in by high walls that rise out of the swamp. A hub of political power for ages, the palace is older than the unified nezumi country itself, and was instrumental in the establishment of the original empire. Its central location, and proximity to the grass-river, allow for easy trade access and communication with the rest of the country while maintaining plenty of security. The city has small districts that house equally small foreign-born populations, but as with any place in the Mirelands, foreigners cannot achieve proper citizenship and have much fewer rights than a nezumi would. Black-Rock is also the economic center of the country, organizing much of its grain exportation. Nezumi rice and grain feeds the country and a substantial portion of the rest of the world as well.

Sulfur-Peak, seat of the Flint-Sickles
Cinder-Fur’s birthplace has grown up from a hostile, mountainside prison to a city full of industrialized buildings that hang off crags and cliffs and are built into the mountain itself. The city bustles with production, and produces a fair share of the country’s greatest prize: gunpowder, a technology unique to the region because of its unique mineral wealth. Resting high in the northern mountains, the city’s location had long-since housed a great many gangs of nezumi bandits before the prison, the city’s oldest landmark, was established to clean up the area. Much of the Flint-Sickles’ power is located here, though each city shows their presence in its prison systems.

Wave-Crash, the great school of the Tarnished-Swords
Like the many towns throughout the Mirelands, Wave-Crash draws its name from a prominent landmark within it, namely the main school of the Tarnished-Swords. Bordering the South-Western edge of the great Eastern bay, Wave-Crash was a city built on stilts. Much more traditional in its construction (save for an extensive dock district), Wave-Crash had a stronger emphasis on stout, wide buildings as opposed to tall ones based on location. Most of the buildings were angular, and sloped downward towards the sea to handle large sea-storms. Wave-Crash houses much of the nezumi navy, and provides an inlet for most of the sea-fishermen to get their catch inland. Furthermore, Wave-Crash is also a great exporter of sea-salt.

Sky-Slab, the Sky-Piercers’ watch post
Sky-Slab is the highest elevation in the Southern portion of the country, and only dwarfed by Sulfur-Peak in height throughout the Mirelands. The main headquarters for the Sky-Piercers resides here, along with great telescopes that are maintained by the people of the city as tribute to the clan for its protection. Even after the clan became ‘nationalized’ by the revolution, the tradition persists, and the entire Southern border is visible from the plateau’s urban top. Sky-slab is a relatively small city, but is well industrialized and highly secure. Like many mountain cities, Sky-Slab’s exports are mainly mineral, but its proximity to the bamboo forests often contributes a hefty amount of lumber to its exports as well. Unlike Sulfur-Peak, however, much of Sky-Slab’s mineral wealth is less practical: gold, gems, and other rare metals are much more prominent in their business dealings.

Lost-Isles, the frigid archipelago
Though the Lost-Isles are hardly 'lost’, they serve little purpose beyond a rather massive base for the training of the Mireland’s standing armies. New recruits are first sent to this much harsher environment to ‘toughen up’ before being let loose into general training. There are, however, small villages dedicated to whaling and fishing.

The Scorched Fen
Representing both a long stretch of unforgiving wetland in the eastern side of the continent and the easily overlooked collection of hamlets which resides within it, the Scorched Fen is a place of no great prosperity. Ironically named after a calamitous fire which ravaged its former township, little remains now besides sodden and wild plant life. Farming in the area is made nearly impossible due to excessive and frequent floods, and the sheer depth of damp, infertile soil has crushed any hopes of starting a mining operation anywhere nearby. As a result, well-paying and honest employment is extremely scarce, poverty and crime run rampant, and the lifelong goal of nearly every resident is to leave the place by any means necessary, often through enlistment into the military or apprenticeship to visiting artisans. Curiously, the Scorched Fen is the only marshlike area of the Greatmire to sport a literal criminal underground due to the extensive network of catacombs which runs underneath its surface. Constructed by another civilization well before the area's drastic change in topography, these catacombs now serve as thieves' dens and warrens for impoverished Nezumi, freeing up the space aboveground for those with enough wealth to afford simple shacks on stilts, connected to each other by elevated walkways. Lacking any other means to make a living, these Nezumi often fish for their survival and tame the giant species of local insects, trading them away to caravans in exchange for many other basic necessities.

Economy
The Mirelands’s economy is based on four key pillars: grain, minerals, drugs, and military proliferation. Grain is the simplest; the majority of the Mirelands’s geography is perfect for enormous grain production, leading to surplus even for the rather immense population the region tends to enjoy. As such, Nezumi rice and wheat find their way into almost half of the world’s food, either directly, or as key ingredients in animal feed. Its mineral wealth is also quite simple, exporting surplus ore and other minerals, including precious metals and gems. The only minerals that are forbidden to leave the country are those needed for the production of gunpowder. Many have tried to smuggle and bribe these components out of the country, and all have met with horrible deaths.

The drugs exported by the Mirelands are usually less than well-received by its neighbors. The vast majority of the illegal substance market worldwide is dominated by Nezumi crime-bosses, many of which tie directly back to the Flint-Sickles or one of the other clans. Even so, much of the growing takes place in hidden mountainside groves and atop high plateaus, allowing the government to feign innocence. Every so often they make a show of ‘shutting down’ a production ring, usually an already outdated one, before stealthily cycling all those arrested back into the production system. The primary drug is fang-blight, a cruel little concoction that induces a hyperactive, euphoric bliss. It is highly addictive, and can have lifelong sideffects. Bad batches are rare, and the product is tightly controlled and inspected. Surprisingly, though it sometimes appears in nezumi back-alleys, fang-blight is almost exclusively sold out of country, leaving milder, feel-good drugs for in-border junkies.

Finally, ever since the restructuring of the country began with the Gunpowder Revolution, much of the country’s economy has been tied up in a nigh-endless proliferation of arms and swelling of the military, along with the construction and improvement of defensive structures and offensive technologies.

The Nezumi
General Appearances
By and large, many Nezumi tend to travel about with fairly bad posture, but when standing at full height, they might range from, on average, five to five and a half feet. Their tails have varying lengths, but most usually close to just over half their height. Nezumi clothing can range from simple tunics to fine silken kimonos and hakamas, though culturally, practicality is prized.

Fur colorations vary by rarity. Black or grey are most common by a wide margin, with brown being the next most common, with some combination of the two possible. Much rarer fur colors come with social stigma: white fur, or albino nezumi, are often killed by their parents for being omens of ill will. Many white-furs tend to color their fur with ash to hide their colors when in public, or otherwise remain out of public sight. Finally, the fur color of Cinder-Fur’s line is most rare, with red fur being essentially limited to his progeny. The fur color has a history of scorn in nezumi culture, implying a mix with foreigners sometime in the past.

Societal Values
For the nezumi, honor was an illusion perpetrated by the old empire. This does not mean, however, that loyalty was just as false a concept. Though a nezumi is most immediately loyal to himself and his kin, clan members are immensely loyal to their clans as well. The most overarching sense of loyalty, however, is not necessarily to the idea of a nezumi empire, but to themselves as a people. Business dealings and shadowy activities result in much backstabbing in-country, but there runs a distinct dislike of foreigners and other species in nezumi culture that culminates not necessarily in a feeling of a superiority, but at the very least a general disapproval of the ways of others. Foreign species may live in the Mirelands, but are, at best, second-class citizens. Afforded legal rights similar to a nezumi citizen, they are still subject to intense scrutiny.

Names and titles are the most important thing in nezumi society. At a young age, a sire names his offspring with their first name, one that usually reflects physical characteristics. Titles tend to follow as a nezumi progresses in life. A nezumi’s first name might change with famous actions, erasing physical description in favor of momentous deeds. Usually, a nezumi is only afforded one title that they may use, though the title can change. However, clan-bosses and those of great prestige in nezumi culture may have multiple titles, with Cinder-Fur possessing the most as a mark of respect.

Nezumi tend to place farmers on a lower societal tier, but not by much. Outside the military and clan structures, societal castes are fairly lax and free-flowing, and a true nezumi always values the chance to turn a solid profit. Still, some of the more rural nezumi do not care for the pirates and bandits that harass them, and criminals are as looked down upon as one might suspect so long as their criminal activity happens within the Mirelands. Defrauding, raiding, or pirating from foreign powers is plainly ignored and oftentimes approved of by the general populace along with the new government.

There are some cultural icons of importance to the nezumi as well. Certain weapons earn the right to be named, a rare thing indeed. Furthermore, Cinder-Fur’s three daughters have become darlings of the people, each married into one of the other three clans. The ‘Red Ladies’ as they are called all share their father’s distinct coloring, and make appearances from time to time. Generally, they tend to accompany the occasional envoy to their father’s throne to visit their aging father.

Language
The native tongue of the Nezumi is decidedly difficult, and more likely practically impossible, for a member of a different species to pronounce simply because they lack the appropriate facial and dental structure to mimic the sounds produced. Unsurprisingly, the nezumi language is harsh-sounding to the uninitiated, with even friendly conversation among compatriots sounding aggressive and predatory to unaccustomed ears. A nezumi’s prominent teeth provide much of the incentive for the language’s pronunciation, with many clicks, hisses, light squeaks and chittering sounds. It has been rumored that nezumi mothers, in those fleeting moments before beginning to teach their children the harshness of the world, have produced soft purring sounds. Of course, anyone who had spent any time around nezumi traders and listened to them speak would find that very idea to be preposterous.

Nomenclature
As untrained listeners almost invariably experience difficulty identifying and separating distinct aspects of the Nezumi language, and because most foreign species are biologically incapable of pronouncing a wide enough range of sounds required to speak more than broken fragments of it themselves, the rats have found it necessary to translate their names into more common modes of speech that may be spoken and remembered by their neighbors. Without fail after translation, Nezumi naming conventions follow a two-part structure which is usually related to a defining physical trait or mannerism, with great emphasis being placed upon how recognizable and unique to the individual it is. For example, Lady Pale-Fur is thus named for her albinism, which is a rare and visually obvious feature of her personal identity, but it is unlikely that a Nezumi named Grey-Fur or even Brown-Fur exists simply because the feature is too common to hold any real meaning. To inquire about activities of an individual named "Grey-Fur" would confuse most Nezumi, in the same way that asking a human how his or her right-handed friend was feeling.

Occasionally, Nezumi will change their names to reflect well-recognized actions rather than physical characteristics, although it is just as likely that they will adopt titles instead. In either case, the recognition of these actions is extremely important, as a Nezumi's peers will not respect his or her wish to assume a new name or title if they do not feel that it is justified, and it is a point of shame to continue to identify oneself in such a way against the community's wishes. Titles do not accumulate, with most Nezumi only ever possessing one at any single point in their lives, although clan leaders and those in other extremely prestigious positions are afforded titles related to those positions which do not supersede the ones they already possess. Cinder-Fur, as the esteemed Patriarch of the Nezumi, is the only individual in their collective history to possess three titles simultaneously out of respect for his accomplishments.

Government and Military
Aside from the four clans (to be discussed below), the Mirelands maintains a large standing army and a moderate navy. Airship designs purchased (and pilfered) from human traders have been heavily modified to equip gunpowder armaments including rockets and primitive bombs. Most advanced gunpowder technology is kept in the hands of the clans, though there is little concern of actual devices being pilfered by rival countries: they do not have the chemical prowess, nor the mineral resources, to feasibly produce gunpowder either of useful quality, or in useful amounts.

The Supreme Wall houses a large section of the military for defense purposes, and the vast majority of nezumi males that do not have service to the clans join the military for at least some period, keeping its staggering numbers slowly but steadily increasing.

The Clans
Flint-Sickles
The Flint-Sickles had a curious history that had always been entwined with that of the nezumi people. Where the Mire-Shadows were secretive and select, the Flint-Sickles were, at least comparably, an open book. Tasking themselves with the duty of representing the interests of the people, they had long since been at odds with the emperor and his government. All Flint-Sickles were orphans; the clan was family more than anything else and within the clan, organizational structure was fluid. Ingenuity and might were the prime determinants of how far a Flint-Sickle could get before his work eventually took his life.

Banditry was much more the style of the Flint-Sickles than the assassinations perfected by the Mire-Shadows, preferring to pilfer government caravans and, most proudly, venture cross-border and decimate foreign trading caravans that they felt were putting local artisans at risk. In Flint-Sickle territory, the nezumi ways thrived. Gambling dens dotted towns filled with craftspeople, and Flint muscle provided protection for their way of life.

Flint-Sickles also ran all the non-military prisons in the country merely through presence; many Flint-Sickles disguised themselves as commoners to infiltrate the prison systems and eradicate targets while recruiting others, even while their brothers infiltrated the guard-staff. As a result, many prisons now stand as nothing more than fortresses for the Flint-Sickles where they mine their minerals and ore. Most mines were worked by enemies of the clan, or traitors. Nezumi tasked for the mines were marked by having their tails cleaved off. Survivors of raids on foreign caravans also fill the mines, their tongues cut out at their first complaint.

Where Mire-Shadows excel at killing from the dark, Flint-Sickles are masters of infiltration and deception. A Flint-Sickle prides himself on his ability to walk among any crowd and seem as though he belongs. Flint Prisons and mines are filled with tales of famous ninja that hid for months or years within enemy ranks, or even merely within their walls, avoiding detection and amassing the information required to strike at their most vulnerable moment. Strategy is prized greatly among the Flint-Sickles, and knowing your enemy is the first step towards victory.

Flint-Sickles also tend to primarily use weapons that are favored for particular acts of combat. The spear and pole-arm are some of the first weapons a Flint-Sickle learns to wield before branching out into flexible weapons, daggers, and more often than not, sickles and kamas. The use of a weapon not often seen in combat is often enough to earn praise for a Flint-Sickle.

Cinder-Fur’s rise brought increased prosperity to the Flint-Sickles in a way that their mastery over gunpowder had not. Most engineers that work with the substance are members of the clan, though the other clans are allowed to contract their expertise in constructing weapons for particular purpose. They still run the prison-mines, and they certainly still walk among the armies of the nezumi, as well as the civilians, watching for threats to the established nation. Cinder-Fur allows for the clan to mostly act as it wishes, but still steps in to give it proper direction from time to time.

Finally, all Flint-Sickles are given the opportunity to offer their children to the other clans to preserve the orphaned nature of the clan. Otherwise, upon coming of age, the child may elect to join another clan that would have him. Flint-Sickle females are well regarded, but tend to stay within the clan.

Tarnished-Swords
Where the marksmen and the ninja may have their curious customs, the Tarnished-Swords were potentially the most disliked despite their massive numbers. Founded solely by officers of the imperial army that had been dishonorably discharged for anything from refusing to follow orders to executing superiors after poorly fought battles. Fast forward some centuries, and they had managed to fill their own ranks with the finest swordsman in Nezumi culture as well as the shrewdest, most ruthless tactical minds in the country, and perhaps in the world.

Tarnished-Swords follow a strict hierarch that greatly resembles that of the standing Nezumi army, and in modern times supplement the existing military as ruthless, feared field commanders. For many years, though, the Tarnished-Swords led lives nearly as secretive as the Mire-Shadows, held up in great war-schools that were as well defended as the imperial palace, looming over farmlands and constructed quickly and without warning. Tarnished-Swords often traveled alone, policing the roads by mere presence and leaving many a beheaded bandit corpse along the road in their wake. Their strikes were ruthless, brash, and efficient, even crossing borders to burn entire towns and, once, even an entire city, known for defeating armies many times their size through prowess alone.

But the Tarnished-Swords are not forgetful of what they once were, and if there exists a bastion of something resembling honor in the nezumi culture, their schools would be that bastion. Decedents of officers, the Tarnished-Swords carry themselves with pride and grace, quick on their feet, and well-dressed and educated. They differ from their army counterparts in sheer ruthlessness; a Tarnished-Sword is afforded no leeway for failure; the punishment is on-site execution.

The Tarnished-Swords wear anything from elegant kimonos to full armor, complete with ornate kabuto and such. Their blades are all crafted in-house by some of the finest nezumi smiths, and are coveted world-wide for their sheer cutting potential and light weight. The number and style of sword a Tarnished-Sword carries is entirely up to the swordsman, but one or two katana is most common, with emphasis often placed on traditional swordplay, but especially on winning at any cost.

Losing one’s sword or having it break, depending on the circumstances, can be the greatest shame a Tarnished-Sword can endure. Thieves that have ferreted away such weapons have found themselves hunted across the world by enraged rogue clan members who are tasked, by tradition, with beating the thief to death bare handed before retrieving the weapon.

The leader of the clan, despite the relatively new inclusion of females in its ranks, is Lady Pale-Fur, the Sword-Breaker. Once a woman known solely for her beauty, her prowess is now legend. She is the only person alive to have withstood a full hit from Earth-Splitter, Cinder-Fur’s legendary axe, and lived, managing to nick the blade. She and Cinder-Fur have a respectful friendship, and though the older rat has been known to make advances, she coldly refuses. Pale-Fur wields the weapon that grants her title, the Sword-Breaker, a heavy-weight katana that she swings with ease and grace.

Her vice-general is married to one of the Red Ladies, Cinder-Fur’s daughters, who has become an accomplished swordsman in her own right.

Mire-Shadows
While the Flint-Sickles are a social clan with strong ties to the general populace and a surprisingly lenient recruitment policy, the Mire-Shadows are anything but. Renowned for training the deadliest and most feared assassins in the known world, the clan possesses a dedication to secrecy and misinformation that has preserved it for centuries, even dating back to a time when the nezumi were not unified under a single empire. In fact, the manner in which agents of the Mire-Shadows are sworn to silence is perhaps one of the only things that any nezumi citizen can truthfully claim to know; the bodies of traitors wither and die the instant they attempt to put action to their perfidious thoughts, leaving behind nothing but twisted skeletons which are quickly claimed by either the marshes or those more faithful to the clan. This, along with the unexplainable techniques employed by many of the Greatmire's famous ninja, has lead to the belief that they have stolen the power of magic directly from the scholars of Olahn Korlarin - a ludicrous and ignorant claim, but one that the Mire-Shadows are happy to support.

The truth is, unfortunately, far less innocent. While the Mire-Shadows have survived for so long by remaining an enigma and a source of fear within their society, their success comes from embracing a form of dangerous, ritualistic blood magic which grants uncanny power to each member while simultaneously ensuring their absolute and unconditional loyalty to the clan. New recruits must prove that they have sufficient willpower to survive the rites of initiation and a disposition that serves the clan's purposes before they are named and offered training, thus earning their status and access to the clan's secrets. The first rites alone only function as a gateway for Mire-Shadows ninja to acquire power - first in the form of physical strength and agility beyond what normal members of their species could achieve, and later in the mastery of otherwise impossible techniques which defy reason more overtly, such as the ability to alter their appearance to match other Nezumi or cross short distances instantaneously through clouds of smoke, ignoring any obstacles in-between. In all cases, the unavoidable shortening of an individual's lifespan which occurs as a result of these practices, and the increased risk of infection and disease associated with frequent bloodletting in such a putrid environment, both combine to ensure that few nezumi ever dedicate themselves to the art, preferring instead to rely on more traditional techniques and what few rituals they deem imminently practical. The exceptions to this are the clan's shamans - often former ninja who have grown too old or weak to carry out missions but still wish to serve a purpose, who are responsible for performing the rites of initiation, training those recruits brave enough to seek them out, and refining their magic in new and innovative ways before it ultimately claims their lives.

The ruling body of the Mire-Shadows is composed of an odd numbered council of nezumi chosen to be trained exclusively as shamans near the beginning of their recruitment. As the only public face of the clan, it is the council's foremost priority to deflect suspicion and preserve the clan's secrets using any means necessary, controlling the flow of information both internally and externally. This has created a significant divide between the ninja who carry out missions and the shamans who develop their forbidden magic; most techniques learned by the latter would draw too much scrutiny if witnessed by an outsider, resulting in a majority of special training requests by the former being denied in order to eliminate the risk of discovery. Aside from a small number of rituals which have remained in practice since the beginning of the clan's history, most of the accumulated knowledge of the shamans is never taught directly to others, instead ending up stored inside hidden archives in anticipation of a time when the nezumi no longer need to fear the judgment of other races. The few ninja who are permitted to study even the smallest fraction of these archives must do so with the unanimous trust of their council, which itself is an occasion most members of the clan never live to witness.

Currently, the three standing members of the Mire-Shadows council are Night-Eyes, the Whisperer; Sorrow-Drinker, the Observer; and Wither-Paw, the Keeper. Having remained in power since before the beginning of Cinder-Fur's revolution, their support for the new regime was largely motivated by self-interest; the "old-world ideal" of peace between the nations promised to invite spies from across the entire continent to flock to the Greatmire and deny the clan enough authority to retaliate in kind, and with the only alternative sweetened by the Flint-Sickles' gifts of superior technology, the council's decision was clear. Still, in spite of their reasons, the Mire-Shadows are quite loyal to Cinder-Fur for his efforts in restoring their society, and Night-Eyes in particular is very pleased to have earned himself a beautiful red-furred wife as a result.

Furthermore, it is said that the only thing a Nezumi fears more than to have his secrets revealed, is to have them revealed to a foreigner. Nowhere is this more evident than in the Shroud, a massive cloud of obfusticating magic which hangs over the Greatmire like an unrelenting fogbank. Undetectable by natural senses, few creatures are aware of its existence even among the Nezumi, and only diviners and those who maintain it are aware of its true purpose. Magical sight is obscured by the cloud in proportion to its density, which grows thick around many key locations by the willful effort of its creators, the Mire-Shadows. Exactly what the Nezumi are hiding is nearly impossible to tell, as great skill in the art of divination is required to penetrate the Shroud deep enough to determine where it is strongest, and only a peerless master has any hope of subverting it completely. Cinder-Fur himself is no more aware of what the Mire-Shadows are trying to protect than those whom they are trying to protect it from, but as their efforts indirectly benefit his entire kingdom, he is more than happy to let them continue.

Sky-Piercers
Although the Sky-Piercers could easily be mistaken for a clan with a strong military background in modern times, its roots may instead be traced back to a modest community of elite archers with far more concern for individual perfection than superiority through numbers. Considered indispensable simply for the impeccable accuracy and skill of each of its individual members, the clan was directly responsible for many victories during the previous empire's ultimately successful attempt to unify the Greatmire under one government. Many stories are still recounted to this day of the famous founder of the clan, Needle-Hide, who was said to have broken a siege single-handedly by killing the enemy general through a slitted window as he paced the halls of his fortress five floors and an entire village's distance away. Tales of this nature, exaggerated or not, are extremely common among the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Sky-Piercers, and the only truly consistent theme to them is one of deadliness and flair that have come to define the clan as a whole.

When the Sky-Piercers were first asked to join the revolution, many nezumi expected them to refuse. Unlike the other three major clans, they were not left wanting for glory or purpose during times of peace, and were still hosting regular archery tournaments and accepting a steady flow of new recruits as if completely unaffected by the gradual stagnation of their society. It was only at the words of the patriarch Hook-Tail that they were moved to action against their old benefactors, driven by the promise of something more real than they would ever find in their petty competitions. Many younger members of the clan who were born into the decadence plaguing their society scoffed at their leader, refusing to place their faith in his wild claims of fame and glory, and chose instead to become defectors rather than risk the reprisal of their government. Others, especially those who had been raised on the grand stories of their ancestors, knew all too well how few heroes the Greatmire had sired within the past decade. It was these few, spurred into action by Hook-Tail, who set out to locate what they considered to be the one true soul of their clan, and reclaim it through bloody conflict. In revolution, they saw a chance to be remembered.

However, while old stories still glorify each Sky-Piercer separately by both name and deed, no other clan has changed quite as dramatically since the advent of Cinder-Fur's revolution. Gifted with powerful flintlock rifles and rocket artillery, and faced with the overwhelming support of a civilian population which was more than willing to fight its own government, the clan had both weapons which demanded a relative minimum of training and an abundance of soldiers itching to wield them. Seemingly overnight, the size of the Sky-Piercers more than tripled, and their destructive potential rose immeasurably in the process. The previous generation's archers refused to put away their archaic weapons, calling the Flint-Sickles' firearms unreliable and inaccurate, but not even their leader could doubt the strength of an entire army of civilians who could kill from outside a sword's reach after mere weeks of practice. When organized squads of Nezumi riflemen took the already underequipped loyalist faction by storm, permanent amends to the clan's recruitment policies were made to accomodate the mastery of less antiquated forms of ranged weaponry, although the expectations of its recruits remained as high as ever. Many temporary members were stripped of their status after the dust had settled, although those who remained still easily outnumbered their bow-wielding comrades several times over.

The aftermath of Cinder-Fur's revolution shocked Hook-Tail. For the first time throughout the clan's long history, the Greatmire's citizens began to recount a victory that did not belong to a single famous archer, but to all nezumi who called themselves Sky-Piercers, and the invincible coalition that they had joined. He had never before experienced a feeling of unity so strong amongst his comrades, and while he did not wish to see any of their names forgotten as part of any whole, no matter how great, he also saw merit in the whole itself, and did not wish to see its greatness diminished through the lens of individualism. In order to resolve this dilemma he sought Cinder-Fur's counsel, but the wise leader of the Nezumi was still raised as a ninja, and did not possess what Hook-Tail considered an adequate understanding of the recognition he craved. Still, at his leader's suggestion, he pledged several archers and marksmen to man the Supreme Wall and train the militia guarding it, leaving ultimately unsatisfied with the result. These days, Hook-Tail believes that conflict is the only possible path to the glory he seeks for his clan, and impatiently waits for Cinder-Fur to realize his ambition and send the Sky-Piercers out into the world so that they may conquer it in his name.

The Patriarch
(Much history of the nezumi people is contained in the end of Cinder-Fur’s profile)
Full Name: Cinder-Fur the Flint-Clawed, Patriarch of the Gunpowder Dynasty, Grand-Boss of the Four Clans

Species: Rat

Gender: Male

Age and Place of Birth: 58, Sulfur Peak Prison

Appearance: Cinder-Fur earns his life-long name from his rather rare fur coloring. In a land of rats ranging from white to black, with dashes of brown, a red-furred rat was a rarity. In fact, the fur color was nearly unheard of, prompting rumors that perhaps his lineage was not necessarily purely rat.

Otherwise, despite patches of silver fur starting around his muzzle with age, the Patriarch is rather spry for a relatively old age. Most rats retire not much older than Cinder-Fur is currently, but he seems to have no need of slowing down. Cinder-Fur is known for dressing in practical clothing. Even with the prosperity of his rule, and the lavishness of the citadel he rules from, Cinder is usually clad in a black hakama and black-lacquered, leather breastplate, and tends to remain barefoot.

Cinder-Fur’s ears show nicks and missing little pieces that demonstrate his life on the front lines, and his left ear shows more significant scarring: burns sustained from his fondness of gunpowder.

Family: By way of a departed wife, Cinder-Fur has had four sons and three daughters. Three of his four sons have died from varied causes, and the last remaining son leads a rocket brigade that mans the Supreme Wall. His daughters have all been married off to each of the three other clans, and at least one has born him a grandson.

Friends: Cinder-fur likes to fashion himself as a people’s ruler. He understands well how he rose to power, riding on public disdain for a ruling class that had grown too removed from what made their people great. Still, he keeps a small retainer that frequents his court and many times accompanies him on travels comprised of a fair variety of persons, including at least one individual from each of the other three clans.

Enemies: Besides wartime enemies and some potential stragglers who still support the old regime, his enemies are not terribly numerous.

Love Life: As a widower, Cinder-Fur is mostly reluctant to go looking much for love, but has been known to take a consort sometimes, if it suits him.

Likes: Games of dice, the smell of gunpowder, traveling, training, music, theater, and fighting.

Hates: The equality (or even superiority) of his people not being recognized, politics, upstarts that think he’s too old to rule.

Fears: Cinder-Fur’s primary fear is that his successor will forget what allowed the gunpowder revolution to succeed: one, the support of the people, and two, the unique power afforded them by the then-new applications of gunpowder. Cinder-Fur believes that if the country’s wartime technological development is allowed to flounder or stagnate, the other nations will eventually find out how to produce gunpowder and use it. Fortunately, the minerals are unique to their region, and selling it is strictly forbidden, but the fear still nags at Cinder-Fur as he ages.

Strengths: Aside from training and experience, Cinder-Fur has great hearing and still rather spry reflexes. Cinder-Fur is also very level-headed and shrewd, with a propensity for tactical thinking and a tendency towards frank, but persuasive, communication. He also has a nearly unparalleled understanding of gunpowder and its potential application, and is quickly excited by the chance to test new weaponry.

Weaknesses: Though still a capable fighter, Cinder-Fur is still much older than many of the folk he deals with. Whether in combat or simply in the course of intense political debate, the elder rat sometimes feels his age catch up with him and requires a bit of time to rest. Furthermore, his age makes recovery from illness or disease take longer than it would for someone younger.

Weaponry and Gear:
Kusarigama: The swordsman’s bane, the sickle and chain has been a favored weapon of Cinder-Fur’s since his days in training. If challenged to single combat and without anything more… explosive, Cinder-Fur is still plenty fluent in the weapon’s use. In fact, the one he usually carries was used to execute the past emperor, earning in the nickname “The King-Killer.”

Earth-Splitter, the Dark Axe: Forged from ore rumored to have been retrieved from a meteorite that crashed into Sulfur Peak Mountain ages passed, the axe has been an object of legend since before Cinder-Fur rose to power. As tall as a rat, and rumored to be twice as heavy, the black-metal axe seems to reflect barely any light, with a notch missing from its wide blade. The axe sits on a mount behind Cinder-Fur’s place in the royal court, untouched for over a decade and a half. There are rumors that Cinder-Fur cannot even lift the massive weapon anymore, though only a fool would make such a proclamation to his face.

Flint-Claw: Perhaps even more than the axe, the leader of the gunpowder revolution is known for his claw-rings, one made of brushed steel, the other of flint-stone, that allow him to create a spark at will simply by snapping his fingers. They also make splendid slashing weapons, too, like any rat’s claws.

Training:
Ninja: Cinder-Fur is a clan boss of one of the Ninja clans, and as such possesses a keen understanding of subterfuge and stealth, along with assassination and intelligence gathering. This lends him a keen understanding of unconventional warfare.

Rocketeer: Cinder-Fur’s reign is known as the Gunpowder Dynasty for a reason; as a foremost expert in the wartime application of gunpowder in the world, Cinder-Fur’s approval of an up-and-coming engineer’s design can send his career to great heights. Furthermore, he’s also usually quick to go to any demonstrations. The Patriarch quite likes blowing things up.

History:
Character Biography

To understand Cinder-Fur’s rise to power, one must understand the history of his people.

For almost a century, The Mirelands had been ruled by an aristocratic dynasty that came to claim the country for their own on the backs of Nezumi artisans; their craftsmen were known worldwide for their skill, and their immense armies solidified their place as a mighty trading power. The country exported much of the gain consumed in the quickly growing neighboring nations along with its other goods. Still, war gave way to peace, and the great Nezumi armies grew stagnant and lax, their numbers dwindled as budgets were cut in favor of more lavish castles to receive foreign diplomats. Even as plague bubbled up throughout the country, the ruling class enjoyed fine banquets with other royalty, removed from the troubles of their people. Locked in the Great Citadel, they thought themselves impervious to siege; no fool would rebel in the face of such defenses.

Half a nation away, Cinder-Fur was one of a handful born to felons locked in the Sulfur Peak prison. By tradition, the children of prisoners were pawned off to the four clans; great schools of combat that enjoyed particular specialties. They selected youths from the lot and bid on them with funds that served no other use in such peacetime. These elite warriors had little use for their skills but challenges issued between clans.

The clan that adopted Cinder-Fur, and gave him his given first name, was one of two clans of Ninja, feared warriors of shadow and deceit. Whereas the other clan, the Mire-Shadows, was renowned as an elite selection of the best and most elite assassins the world had to offer, Cinder-Fur’s clan, the Flint-Sickles, was known for being much more sociable, selecting a wide variety of recruits to fold into the family. Acting as anything from spies to sabotage teams, his clan had a storied history of routing armies with trickery and flair, and particularly for its members being known for peculiar choices in weaponry. Cinder-Fur assassinated the blacksmith that forged his famous axe by his late teens, and used it to great success in tournaments, rising through the Clan’s ranks and earning the favor of its elder members.

Still, the people were restless with inaction. Cinder-Fur could sense it like any true nezumi could, but there was no catalyst, no unifying force. It was gunpowder that would answer this call, used for almost a half a decade for smoke-bombs and such minor devices. Its practicality was limited until Cinder-Fur implored his clan elders to invest in its production, describing the many possible uses he saw for this wonder powder. Cinder-Fur could see their salvation; a nation that soared above the others on clouds of sulfurous smoke.

Over the next decade, Cinder-Fur honed the production of the powder and its application. The emperor and his retinue even witnessed the first fireworks display, a showing of solidarity that hid darker tones of the power of the Flint-Sickle’s new weapon. Soon, Cinder-Fur rose to the status of Patriarch of his clan, and saw the moment to put his plan into action.

Cinder-Fur called a meeting of the four clans, the Flint-Sickles, the Mire-Shadows, the two ninja clans, the Sky-Piercers, the famed clan of marksmen, and the Tarnished-Swords, the equally renowned clan of samurai, at the Sulfur Peak mines to demonstrate his newest gunpowder applications, one as a gift to each clan.

The Mire-Shadows were given small, easily thrown bombs that could crumple a warrior’s armor with ease. The Sky-Piercers were given flint-lock muskets and explosive-tipped arrows to lay siege like no archer had ever before. Finally, the Tarnished-Swords were given great charges that could level any impediment to their war march. Each of the clans was given these things in return for their willingness to follow him in a grand revolution, the Gunpowder Revolution that would restore the Nezumi to their former greatness.

The standing people of The Mirelands rallied around the cause, old soldiers long since retired took up their spears and polearms, bows and swords. The revolution swept the country, and by Cinder-Fur’s early thirties the clans and their army found themselves ready for a siege on the Great Citadel. The grand building had been designed for an age that Cinder-Fur had already surpassed. Rockets and bombs were hindered little by stone walls and wooden gates. Though portions of the army still supported the Emperor, many defected in the face of the overwhelming strength of the revolution.

There were, of course, casualties. Over the course of the revolution, Cinder-Fur’s wife and two of his sons died of the plague. The third, trained from youth like his father, died in the final assault on the citadel. Cinder-Fur executed the archer who killed his son personally, and tied his severed head to a rocket fired out over the newly conquered city. His last son and his daughters were all too young for the front lines, and survived to follow him to his new place of residence after the revolution’s success.

The process of transitioning the country from one ruler to another was not difficult. Many of the people supported Cinder-Fur, and the clans were content to allow him to rule so long as none of the other clans were placed above its brethren. The Flint-Sickles still occupy their original territory, but there is some obvious favor for them given Cinder-Fur’s continued role as the Clan Boss.

The next couple decades were spent in a breakneck sprint towards progress. Cinder-Fur watched the armies of The Mirelands swell, the artisans craft new wonders, the harvests flourish. The Supreme wall, the defense of old that had spanned the border of The Mirelands with its neighboring countries, was refurbished and outfitted with new artillery; carts of rocket-powered, explosive arrows that could decimate encroaching armies. Cinder-Fur’s last son became the commander in charge of one portion of the wall even as his daughters were married off into the other three clans as a show of respect.

And now as an elder rat, Cinder-Fur sits with his axe hung up behind his throne, the golden symbols of the previous emperor and all the lavishness of the palace left in place, save for each seal of the emperor being crudely cut with deep gouges to mar it. In fact, that was simply the new official seal of the Gunpowder Dynasty; a crossed-out copy of its predecessor. Cinder-Fur has aged, certainly, but he still sees greatness on the horizon for the nezumi. Engineers compete for his favor with more designs for gunpowder weapons, artisans flood the world markets with their exquisite crafts, and the country’s grain once again feeds mouths worldwide.

The nezumi flourish under the watchful eye of the fire-furred king, and no one quite knows where the great wave of their renaissance will crest.

I hope this is all quite useful. Much more of the history of the Mirelands will be developed with time, especially through books written by historians submitted for approval by the clans.


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