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 Crusader Kings 3 Crusader Kings 3 is the third instalment in Paradox Interactive's incredible grand strategy series focusing on the mediaeval period. What sets it apart from other grand strategy games is you don't play a nation but a dynasty, your one and only main goal is to keep your dynasty alive, everything else is just an extra goal in an entirely open mediaeval sandbox. Released 1st September 2020 it (in my opinion) provided a much better base for a grand strategy dynasty game than the already great Crusader Kings 2 did with far more refined systems, though obviously lacked the breadth of content that a decade older game provided. But, with the release of the Royal Court expansion on the 8th February 2022, a plethora of content from the previous game has been updated and entirely new systems and mechanics implemented. And on top of it all Crusader Kings 3 is by far Paradox' most accessible game with a clear easy to understand UI and tool tips that help greatly in a genre known for having a pretty steep learning curve and an obtuse interface. If you've seen my other Paradox LP's then you'll know I like to focus extremely heavily on narrative and showcasing the actual mechanics of the game gets pushed to the side in favour of trying to discover and show a compelling story. So if you are looking to this LP to learn how to play Crusader Kings 3 I'm afraid it will be of little help. However, saying that, if any major systems or mechanics crop up that non-PDX players don't understand I (or very likely others in the thread) can happily explain or showcase specifics so certain things are easier to follow. Just as when I play PDX-games regularly I don't like to play to win, instead trying to play to the style of whatever character / nation I'm currently controlling. So I have no plan for how this will unfold - beyond that we will be starting as a viking and seeking to settle elsewhere. A large part of the new Royal Court expansion is to do with cultures, and the new ability to diverge or hybridise cultures, so hopefully we can see some of that happening. The other key component of Royal Court is well, royal courts. Which requires you to be a king or an emperor, so that will also be a fairly immediate goal for us lest we miss out on all the new content. A Feast Of Foreign Shores Starting in the 867 start date, vikings are the bane of practically the entire western world, but luckily we are vikings. I'll be starting in the tiny county of Rogaland on the western shores of Norway, as a lowly but competent warrior at the helm of a clan of raiders.  867 is a chaotic time, as opposed to the somewhat more stable 1066 start date, which gets you into the thick of Christian - Muslim Crusade/Jihad faster. Instead, kingdoms will more quickly break apart, raiders from the north and from the steppe will press into Europe and the middle east, and familiar cultures and faiths may be displaced or disappear entirely by the time we reach the 11th century. And to further compound that I will be setting the game rules to ensure there is even greater instability and more chances for diverging cultures and faiths to appear.  As opposed to my Stellaris LP which had an unwieldy amount of mods that essentially made the game unplayable in later stages, I only have a handful of almost entirely cosmetic mods this time around, with only major mod in the form of Sinews of War, this is mostly because it calculates and shows the population and production of every province, which will prove useful for narrative reasons. Crusader Kings 3 has actually proven to be one of PDX's most moddable games, with some truly astounding mods already made and we are barely two years into it's life. (including one that integrates CK3 with Mount & Blade Bannerlord, so you can play out the battles in one game and have the results transferred to the other seamlessly) I will also be using Cities Skylines as much as possible, purely for flavour to help show what our settlement(s) look like. And at certain key intevals, major decisions facing our ruler will be put to a thread vote. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
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______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ I - 867 - 869 - Rogalander Expedition II - 869 - 873 - Holstein Hop II.V All-Thing of Summer 873 III - 873 - 881 - To Southern Seas IV - 881 - 888 - Salvation V - 888 - 898 - Ratu Layung VI - 898 -906 - Alva the Great VII - 906 - 909 - One Last Fight  VIII - 909 - 914 - The King and the Prince Crisis Now fucked around with this message at 00:52 on Mar 1, 2022 |
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Feb 12, 2022 16:09
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I - 867 - 869 A cold wind blows over Midgard, carrying with it the stench of ash and blood. From shores of ice and snow our brethren venture forth across the whale-road in search of gold and glory. Though we have never ventured more than a hundred rests from our home, tales that trader and raider alike spin from their tongues over mead table and market stall rouse the heart and conjure images of lands and peoples I can barely believe.  In no short time we too will weave our own saga. For I am Alva Veisla, and I refuse to pass into the halls of Valhalla until a crown sits upon my head and a thousand wailing widow's curse my name.  For two years now I have ruled over and protected Jæren or Jaðarr, the heart of Rogaland on the western shores of Scandinavia.   A town of some four thousand people, and another fifteen thousand or more farmers and hunters and fisherman that live in the fjords and islands around. I also hold sway over the communities of Rygjarfylki and Ogvaldsnes, but they are so small to barely be worth mentioning, perhaps my successor over Rogaland will one day make them great towns, but I shall not be here to see it, for my banner will hang over a foreign throne.   And who am I you ask, to make such grand designs on the world? I know not my mother for she died bringing me into this world, and my father was a petty mercenary with no clan nor hold to his name. He would not surrender me to the wilds nor set me on the knee of some local chief to be adopted in a knésetja, and so at his side I grew and learned to fight.   After father died in some muddy field fighting some bandits for some petty king, I returned to the town of our birth that he oft-mentioned, Jæren. And found it wanting.  Jæren had seen a successive line of bad chieftains and corrupt town councillors, bereft with banditry and extortionate taxes and 'mysteriously disappearing ' crops and supplies from storehouses. When I seized power from the previous chieftain two years past there were many that decried me a usurper, a glorified bandit. But time has soothed their tempers, and renewed order and growing prosperity has given them faith in my abilities. But, I cannot be queen of a tiny backwater town alone.  Those that sat on my council may have grown to trust me, if a little, though certainly didn't like me.  None more so than my Godi Valdemar, a cowardly man who wished his sword as sharp as his tongue. But unfortunately the one who communes with the Gods holds greatest sway over the people of this town and if he were so inclined he would incite them against me. And so we must do what we can to ensure we remain in his, and the Gods' good graces.   Speaking of the council, it is without a marshal, as few wish to take up the mantle of leading the band of peasant-come-warriors, brigands and tired old mercenaries that dwell within Jæren. And what's more the town has none practised in healing, should the never ever arise, and it most assuredly will sooner or later. What little gold the town has left at its disposal is put up as a bounty for those wishing to enlist their services and word is passed onto the traders to carry with them to whichever settlement they frequent next.   Come the next fortnight and much to our delight, fresh blood is starting to find its way into the lonely old town. A handful of seasoned warriors wish to offer their services, though seeing as initial payment is upfront, who knows how they'll react in a year or two upon seeing their regular measly pay that the town can provide. Haraldr had spent much of his life leading a group of warriors in the mountains to the east of the town, skirmishing with the clans of Telemark and Vestfold and had become a proficient leader of men, though he is dare I say it more stubborn than I and is set in doing things his way. It's convenient then that his way will benefit the town, and so marshal he will be while I oversee Rogaland.   Two men came forth offering to become the new physician for my court, Gunnar and Ingjaldr. Though I would never say it to their faces, if my life depend on their 'skilled hands' but the two of them seemed to barely know that much more than the common townsperson when it came to ailments and injuries.  Gunnar it seemed knew only slightly more than Ingjaldr, however Ingjaldr immediately caught my eye. Where as the former had been taught by a Christ-man's missionary the basics of medicine in the court of Tunsberg, the latter had taught himself surgery and homemade remedies while crewing countless raider expeditions in far off shores. He offered to show me first hand how good he was at fixing a broken limb if I were to decline him, I think me and Ingjaldr will get along just fine.   Frankly the man can kill far better than he can heal, and to keep him cooped up in the Jæren longhouse would be a great dishonour, no, Ingjaldr will be my physician and champion.  Vémundr, my steward is still just a boy, barely turned 18 and like all his age still yearns to see the world beyond this town and our shores before the anchor of age holds him down here. He wishes to follow the many of our kind that ventured south to serve beneath the great king of Miklagard in the Varangian Guard, something I would have dearly desired, but I hear the Christ followers would be even less welcoming of a woman warrior than my fellow norse men. I of course accept his request to travel to the great city and enjoy his youth soldering and adventuring in the strange Greek lands. It would be monstrous of me to keep another marooned here when their heart seeks far off shores.  The past week has been spent closely working with the Godi, doing everything I can to get him on my side, and with luck it would seem to have worked as this morning I found a letter in my chambers from him - though I confess to not knowing my written words as well as my ability to swing an axe, but I got the gist of the message, Valdemar is finding me more amicable as of late.  The past week had however also been filled with tales of wonder and adventure from Ingjaldr, who at every opportunity regaled me his exploits in his youth, of far off foreign lands. Dreams of glory pull at my heart and I cannot sit idle in Jæren a moment longer, it is approaching two and a half years of being in this town, my sword arm grows weak and my senses dulled by this chieftan's chair, I must go a viking.  The call is made that a grand expedition will depart from Jæren in a week's time, already warriors flock in from the countryside, hunters and woodsmen with their bows and axes, longships approach from down the coast. Valdemar is appointed custodian of the town in my stead while I'll be absent, which he is only more than happy to accept.  I may have spent the past years in this quiet town, but I do not forget where I came from. We train with Haraldr and Ingjaldr alike and thankfully within days we are back in fighting form.     By the 25th day of Þorri (February 4th) we are ready to depart. Two and a half thousand hungry vikings with an appetite for the plunder of foreign shores.  From the bow of the lead longship, with Ingjarldr at out side as our guide, we sound our horn and the twenty ships of the Rogalander Expedition depart.  After a month at sea we land on Christian land, land of the Dutch, where thick noxious bogs and marshes await us. Nestled on and islet we set our sights on the small town of Bergen op Zoom.  It's paltry garrison is no march for the two thousand Norsemen and the town quickly falls. But few defenders means little plunder, and there is not much to be gained from these isolated marshy hovels. Still, I have tasted my first real raid, and now I only want more.   Ingjarldr directs us further down the coast, deeper into the land of the Franks, once united by a great king 'Karl', but now his descendants bicker and fight for the scraps of his once great Francia. At the tip of the mainland we came to Bretagne where other Norsemen had invaded and settled before us. Ingjarldr it seems had a history with Olafr Veoy and was eager to raid his castle of Brest.  The fortress proved a greater challenge than the tiny Dutch town, but a welcome fight to best our fellow Norsemen who had grown weak behind stone walls and forsaking our ways for those of the local Christians. We mistake them for Franks but Ingjarldr tells us these Bretons are Celtic people, who once ruled most of the land before made to kneel to the might of the Kjárrs, once the most powerful rulers in the world but now only their ruins remain of which Bretagne had a few.  I wished to fight more of these Celts, to see what they are made of and we sail north to Albion.  The isles of Albion are beset by war, as the Sons of Lothbrok tear the island apart to make their new kingdoms. The Anglo-Saxons make for formidable opponents, honed by decades of conflict with the three brothers and Ingjarldr advises us to stay clear of the mainland proper lest we seek to invade proper and face large battles to stake our claim to a parcel of his bountiful land. Up the Severn Estuary we sail until reaching the southern shores of Bretland, home of the Welsh.  Castle Caerllion proved even greater an obstacle than Brest, a far more intact Ro-Man fortress but it too fails to our assault, and we take everything of value back to the longships.  After departing Caerllion we made the short hop to Ireland, to resupply in the port of Dublin, a new and prosperous Norse town in the heart of the Celtic island. It is here we meet with a trader who has come from home, from Rogaland, but bares ill tide. In our absence, the neighbouring Agder clan has raided Jæren. Apparently the town itself was left mostly intact, but our longhouse was ransacked and everything we personally held dear was stolen from us by the bastard Jarl Kjotve. Some of the men wish to return home, hoping to protect their loved ones, and I am almost tempted to send the expedition back, but we have come this far, we have so much more to see.   Those that wish to return stay in Dublin to catch the next boats heading back toward home, we press on. Back across the sea we venture to the mainland, down the coast of the Franks towards the Land of the Visigoths, or more specifically the Basque.  Here on the shores of Iberia, the remains of these Romans could hardly be called ruins at all, these are practically intact towns and fortifications that look as they must have in centuries past. With great effort we force our way into Irun to find a treasure trove of plunder. But more than any gold trinkets our mind has been so inflamed with talk of these Romen, Ingjarldr speaks of them with the same reverence one affords the Gods. I demand he take us to their homeland at once.  The cold embrace of our home is long gone as we pass through a tiny strait into the Mediterranean Sea, to our south lies a land that even Ingjarldr knows little of, Africa, where the sandy beaches extend inward forever and tribes older than any of Scandinavia dwell. To our north is the Serkir, great conquerors from the far end of this long inland sea who have made great enemies of the Christians. Ingjarldr strongly opposes raiding their coast and he drives our ships onward, to Rome.  The Kjárr no longer live in Rome we are told, in his stead the great priest-king of the Christians now resides. A man with more wealth than a thousand longships could carry. We land on the shores of Italia, in the town of Ostia, once the main port of these romans, and though dilapidated and in much need of repairs these roman fortifications are truly immense and it'll likely take a protracted siege to actually take this port if we wish a clear path to Rome.  Scouts bring dire word that the priest-king has had his captain-general amass all the willing people of Latinum to join him in trying to drive us off.  the core of this "Papal Army" is formed of highly armoured horsemen the likes of which we have never faced, and their commander, Herlembaldus is a callous cruel man who will give us no quarter.  Let him come, we will find glory or death at the gates of Rome.  We stand our ground, take our place of honour in the shieldwall and face down the Papal 'cataphracts'. Ingjarldr is like a beast uncaged, a decade of languishing in the north, but it is here he comes alive once more, cutting an unstoppable bloody swathe through the Papal lines.  Despite their overwhelming numbers, these 'civilised' Christians with their superior weapons and armour prove unable to best us. With the professional soldiers fallen, the mostly peasant army rout, victory is ours! Herlembaldus, the snivelling wretch of a man demands we take his life, so he doesn't have to return to his priest-king with the shame of defeat hanging over him. We let him live, so he may tell of our glorious deeds this day.  Ingjarldr is quick to temper the fires of glory within us, telling us how depleted our forces are and how weary the men are after the battle. We may yet take Ostia, but should the Papal Army return, they will certainly defeat us and we will lose everything.  I order the men to take what they can from the outskirts and to return to the longships. But I cannot leave this place without at least setting eyes on this great Rome at least one. I have Ingjarldr acquire us some of the local's clothing and he takes me on a rowing boat down the river Tiber into the heart of the great old city. And frankly I wish I hadn't, the tales Ingjarldr weaved in my mind were far grander than the pile of rubble that awaited us. This city's days of grandeur are long behind it, now all the remains are sad reminders of it's past glories and those clinging to them.  We return to the ships and seek riches elsewhere in Italia.  Amalfi, Ingjarldr tells us is loyal to the 'true Kjárr', and after our moment of confusion tells us that the great king of Miklagard is the successor to the Romans, and 'Constantinople' they call it may be the great shining city I seek. Then we will go to Constantinople.  But first we continue along the Italian coast, where we find our greatest haul yet in Salerno. My name begins to proceed to me, and the Prince of the city, sensing his defeat, sallies forth through the city gates, presenting a wealth of treasures and trinkets in return for the city's safety. I cannot be seen to be soft, or easily bargained with by Christians.   We take Guaifer's offer, and demand his son as tribute, and make promise that while the boy lives we will never set torch to his city again.   Before we can go raiding into the land of the Greeks, I wish to sail south, to the shores of Egypt where the oldest kingdoms known are said to have existed.  For once Ingjarldr has no tales to tell of his place, Alexandria, and it is in fact our new adopted little clan member who can divulge something of his land, so named for the greatest general who has ever lived, who conquered all the east before even the time of the Romans. But like them there now remains only sad old ruins, though the immense lighthouse is truly a marvel of engineering. The boy recalls fanciful stories of man-made mountains of sandstone that the god-kings of old Egypt are buried beneath to the south.   These Serkir or Arabs who have come to call this land their new home over the past century or two meet us with a mix of horror and fascination (at least the ones not in the settlements we are directly raiding), a far cry from the immediate outward hostility of the Christians further north. But the heat of this land is like nothing I have ever experienced, nor wish to experience any longer. If such wonders lay further along the banks of the Nile, then they will be for other's eyes, the cool sea air beckons once more.  As we cross the Mediterranean once more and enter the Aegean Sea, sea traffic increases exponentially, where as most of Europe seemed to be a land shrouded in the shadows of former glories and empires or peoples who have yet to make their greatness, here in the Greek lands their greatness is on display for all to see. Huge fortified cities and temples line the shorelines and immense merchant ships pass us with weary mercenaries looking on us with disdain.  We pass through the Bosphorus without making land. I may be bold but I am no fool, one sight of the walls of Miklagard and I know it is a fight we cannot win, perhaps not even with ten times our number. We slip quickly and silently through the strait as if we stumbled upon a sleeping bear in the forest and hoped not to stir the beast from its slumber.  Across the Black Sea we stop at the Greek colonies in Crimea to plunder the immensely rich castle of Kerch. If this was what a tiny castle at the edge of their empire held then the treasures of Miklagard are beyond counting.  Leaving the open sea we lead the longships down the wide winding rivers of the steppe and into the heart of the land of the Slavs. The forests here and deep and dark, even greater than those found back home, except maybe the ones I hear may lay near the realm of the Sami at the edge of the world. At one point we are forced to haul the ships to the river banks, and carry them for a few miles across the land, with our captured thralls holding our loot. Fearful were we of being ambushed by the local forest tribes, but our numbers must have been so great as to deter them.  The city of Novgorod had to be a destination of our return voyage, to visit the court of Rurik who had left Scandinavia to make his new home here among the slavs.  Rurik has forged an immense kingdom for himself here and made it secure and prosperous, though he has completely forsaken the old ways and adopted the customs and culture of the Rus. But perhaps he was right to do so, we have seen on our journey so many still clinging to the memory of old kings, empires, gods and former greatness, so heavily indebted they are to what was, with no desire to see what could be. The world it seems is in flux, perhaps to fight this ever growing tide would lead to our own downfall, we have much to ponder. But for now we enjoy Rurik's hospitality and regale him of our saga so far.  Two and a half years since we departed, we return at last to home. Our ships overflowing with gold and a heart burdened with a yearning to return to it all, perhaps this time for good.  On a bitter October night the ships of the Rogaland Expedition slip back into the Jæren harbour. The feast in our honour will last all the week to come.   The Rogalander Expedition  Clan Veisla 869 Crisis Now fucked around with this message at 16:27 on Feb 12, 2022 |
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II - 869 - 873 - The Holstein Hop Back home in Jæren once more I can take stock, though the Agder Clan under Kjotve had ransacked the longhouse and taken supplies, the loot we plundered from the expedition more than makes up for it. And our fame is rapidly growing after word of the grand Rogalander-Expedition spreads, with luck in time more people will flock to the town to join us.  The Agder Clan's transgression couldn't be allowed to go without repercussion though, and meeting with Valdemar only confirmed that. The Godi, leading the town in our stead had put up a paltry defence, but a defence nonetheless which is more than I expected for the priest. And for it he was grievously injured trying to stop the raiders.  I so wished to march on Egðafylki and see Kjotve's head on a spike. But I hear a bear of all things has already claimed that bastard's soul, and without him the Agder Clan has disbanded, nothing will come from raiding those towns now but drawing the ire of unrelated peoples.  Arechis, the prince's boy stolen from Salerno, is taking some time to adjust to his new life here in the north. He finds most of our ways cruel and needlessly brutal, but we live in a harsh land and a strong hand is needed. Still, his softer outlook and his Christian kindness sometimes gets the better of me, despite me trying my best to install faith in the Old Gods in the boy.  Many more people are coming to the town now, Askell Gunarrson being one. I only hope his many tall tales are even remotely true, but he is an entertaining enough story weaver and a competent fighter, I will keep him around.  With so many more visitors, traders and renown warriors passing through or staying in Jæren for extended periods it's becoming harder to keep track of, and to meet with them all, and so a new position is created to help. Ali, the steward, is far more concerned with the running of the town itself and the prosperity therein. Sergius Musconidi, a Lombard we captured in Italia has a certain way with words both spoken and written, and I have no qualms with giving him more responsibility. To waste capable people on menial thrall's work would be pointless.  A few weeks after returning to the town, I decide to go on a hunting trip in the woods east of the town with the spymaster Sig, so we may learn in private more of what's happened in our absence.  Sig informs me that as well as the Agder Clan's attack, that Chieftain Rognvaldr of Þrándheimr (much further north along the coast) has been making frequent visits to the town in the last two years, specifically to the homes of my warrior's wifes to 'comfort' them in the two years their husbands were raiding with me. And now said husbands are beginning to find out and demand retribution-   Before we can proceed with the conversation however we sight a massive deer, and he sights us, and begins to charge.  A swift arrow in its neck slows it for a second, but the swing of my axe as I barely dodge the beast catches its face and brings it down. Sig has had quite enough adventure for one day and we make our way back to town, with the new trophy draped over my mount, but now I have a new quarry to hunt.   More and more of the warriors in Jæren are demanding we raid Þrándheimr, that we capture the wife's of Rognvaldr men as revenge. I won't stand for that. Nor will I waste men and resources trekking further north into lands we barely know. I alone will travel to Þrándheimr and restore our lost honour. And I might as well get some gold out of the whole ordeal.      Marshall Haraldr, being a less experienced raider is still more versed in more 'formal' warfare tactics and in the most diplomatic way possible tells me that our victory at the gates of Rome was far more down to luck than any great skill on our part, not that we haven't proved ourselves a great reaver, but fighting pitched battles against disciplined regiments is a far cry from ransacking a town full of peasants. Very well.  Some weeks into the training with Haraldr and we are sparring one-on-one with some of the warriors, when a lowly raider whose name I had not known before that day steps up to fight me. The friendly match quickly turns to a far more vicious bout and it takes some effort to disarm the man. I ask the brave raider his name and get a simple "Játvarðr" grunted back through his exhaustion and quickly draining adrenaline. "Well Játvarðr, you've certainly proved yourselves. Perhaps in our next venture from our shores you can lead a longship rather than sit in the ranks"  I have been spending ever more time with Arechis in between the training sessions with the marshall and meeting with the councillors and town's folk, and for better or worse he is becoming more like us with each passing day, perhaps we can make a mighty viking out of this Christian prince someday.  Half a year has passed since Haraldr began training me and we have drilled and practised relentlessly. Now comes our final test in a mock battle.  It is not enough to simply stand and let the enemy pummel you or charge headlong into their lines and hope for the best, at every moment the ebb and flow of the battle must be observed and responded to. With the marshall's guidance we know our next battles will be fortuitous.  I cannot take a moment longer of this idleness in Jæren. We have seen the riches locked away in far off holds, we have tasted battle and sitting in this chieftan's chair all day listening to the woes of the town is becoming unbearable.  As I speak our brethren are already going forth and carving out new realms for themselves.    It is with luck then, that the great realm of the Karlings to our south fracture ever more day by day. The death of King Ludwig II fractured East Francia with the Bavarians, and now the northern portion of the realm, cut off from the capital in Baden, has grown so weak outside of his control as to break away from the kingdom entirely.  Another opportunity for a quick and easy adventure may not show itself for some time, and I have acquired quite the band of warriors ready and willing to join me in the pursuit of greatness.  The Duchy of Holstein sits on the northern shore of Germania, stradling the mouth of the river Elbe, a key trade route for the East Franks, controlling it may make us rich and powerful and provide the perfect stepping stone in our eventual migration to whatever place we will call our new home.  And Duke Rimbert is a truly detestable man, I'm sure the locals would prefer even a viking chietess over him.  It's time to say goodbye to Jæren. This town has sheltered us well and we have learned much here but the world sits restlessly beyond our shores for me to come and stake my claim. Those that are willing to join me help in stocking up the longships and on 9th July 872 we depart for the last time from Scandinavia to make our home elsewhere.   On a murky but humid summer morning forty ships of the Veisla clan land on the marshy shores of Dithmarschen where a few hundred of the Duke's men await, having been warned of our approach along the Dane's shores.  They prove no match, and only their marshal Unwan is allowed to live, so that he may deliver the message to Duke Rimbert to vacate our new castle.  Despite having no way of winning, only a few dozen soldiers left against our two thousand the Duke refuses, locking himself up in his keep with enough supplies to last a few weeks. We are left with no choice but to sack Dithmarschen and lay siege to the fort.  The siege lasts all of summer and into the middle of autumn, by which point the fort has run out of supplies, and the defending soldiers simply open the gates to us when we promise safe passage away from here, any loyalty to Rimbert fading.  Askell and Játvarðr go into the Saxon longhouse and drag Duke Rimbert out before us, we could simply kill him right here and take this land. But I want him to give it, to hand me his ducal circlet himself and live the rest of his sorry days knowing he was bested by 'northern heathens'.   Alva of Rogaland; the lowly mercenary's daughter and pitiless reaver is no more. I am Jarl Alva, ruler of Holstein.  From a single tiny town I now rule the fortress of Dithmarschen, the monasteries of Neumunster and Cuxhaven, the towns of Itzehoe and Bederkesa and most importantly, the city of Stade, with it it control of all river traffic in and out of the Elbe. Stade at first glance would be the obvious location to set up, but we don't intend on staying here more than a year, two at most.  On the northern shores of the Elbe, in Dithmarschen are great expanses of wetland, any Saxon or Frankish armies from the south will have great difficulty reaching us over land, with many opportunities for us to cut them off.  So despite the damage we ourselves did to the Dithmarschen fortress, and it being far from the most prestigious of holds, it will serve well enough as our makeshift capital, and our longships out in the bay will deter any seaborne incursions.  The champions take bands of warriors out to the various settlements that now lie beneath our rule to pacify any Saxon uprisings and make sure tribute makes its way to Dithmarschen without issue. I meanwhile make preparations to raise a runestone to mark this great occasion, first of many great glories.  While repairs are made in Dithmarschen, the runestone to commemorate our victory here is raised, and we begin preparing for my next step. In a few short days, the champions will reconvene here and together we can decide what piece of Midgard we will carve out for ourselves.    Clan Veisla, 873 Crisis Now fucked around with this message at 15:45 on Feb 15, 2022 |
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Feb 15, 2022 14:06
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Jimmy4400nav posted:Hell yeah, we go a viking and take what is ours. I was going to say this is a thing in Europa Universalis 4, but can't really modelled in CK3. But then I went and looked at some of the new culture traditions and what do ya know: 
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Feb 17, 2022 07:51
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All-Thing of the Summer of 873 With all pressing local issues concluded and out-standing feuds resolved we can move on to the final and most important part of the assembly. Which will decide the course of our clan for the years to come. We have made our first step in forming our new home, but where should our adventuring take us next? Though bare in mind, should our ultimate goal be so grand we may not see it accomplished in our lifetimes, but prepare our sons and daughters to carry on the conquest we start.  __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Marshall Haraldr  We have taken only a slice of Germania, when so much more of it is weak and fractured. Why risk continuing on to other shores and losing everything, when there is so much opportunity for expansion here. We should expand Holstein, and form a new Kingdom where the Saxons have failed.  __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Játvarðr Vámuli  The isles of Britain are wild and untamed, a verdant land where a mighty kingdom can be formed. The Anglo-Saxons must surely be weakened by years of fighting the Ragnarrsons, the southern mainland should be an easy conquest. Or the Celts to the west an even easier goal.  __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Askell Gunarrson  Iberia may prove a good home, at the end of the continent with many natural bottlenecks and with easy access to the great inland sea. The Caliphate of Cordoba can be reasoned with or conquered in time, but the Christian kingdoms hemmed in on the northern shore can be destroyed with ease and form the base of our new kingdom.  __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Hjálmar  Funny you should mention the Christians Askell, because I think striking at them directly will benefit us and all our kind the most. The Christians have been and will continue to be a thorn in our sides while they remain powerful. So let us drive a dagger into their very heart, Rome. We should conquer Rome, dethrone their priest-king Pope, and lay claim to all the Western Mediterranean!  __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Ingjarldr  No. Not the Western Mediterranean. East. To settle for anything but the very greatest of prizes would dishonour the Gods. Why should we have to forge an empire, when we can simply take one. The Great City sits right there, and with enough preparation and men we can take Miklagard, and become legend.  __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Where should the Veisla Clan seek to form it's kingdom? A - Germania B - Britannia C - Iberia D - Italia E - Byzantium If another location is suggested with enough support, then the Clan can be convinced to settle there. The vote will be concluded when one option is far enough ahead of the others.
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Feb 17, 2022 08:47
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It's currently very close between Iberia and Egypt
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Feb 18, 2022 10:30
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III - 873 - 881 - To Southern Seas The All-Thing has been concluded. And the location of our new home was decided. Germania will soon be rife with Frankish soldiers as the armies of the Karlings come to restore order, Britannia is very much the realm of the Ragnarrsons and we would just as likely fight them as we would the local Anglo-Saxons and Celts. Byzantium would indeed be the greatest prize any of us could ever win, but it would also assuredly be our deaths that we find on those immense Greek walls. Iberia and a newer suggestion of Egypt, were the two most talked about realms, despite us knowing very little about the latter. Going by Arechis' descriptions (which in itself is just the hearsay of Greek nobles passed down through the generations in their books) and what little we can glean from thralls captured from Alexandria; it is mostly a wide harsh desert, but the great river The Nile that flows through it is a source of great wealth and temples and tombs to their long lost god-kings litter the land. Iberia on the other hand is dominated by the Umayyads who rule from the great city of Cordoba, it seems unlikely they can be bargained with and should we conquer the Christian kingdoms to the north we will simply put ourselves in the Umayyad path of conquest. So Egypt is it. Atop the tombs of ancient kings the Veisla greathall shall rise.  The Sultan of Egypt, Ahmad Tulunid is however one of the most powerful rulers in the great inland sea, second only to the Basileus - many are surprised to learn we were able to raid Alexandria as all other attempts at viking raids on the shores of Egypt have led to massacres. Perhaps our incursion was the first of many, and the Sultan has since bolstered his armies and defences. An attack on the Sultan will likely end poorly.  Lucky then that there is an island in the western Mediterranean that may serve as the perfect staging point to drive our way into Egypt when the time is right. Crete is a Greek island, but it has for some years been independent of the Basileus and under the rule of the Hafsid dynasty - foreign infidels who the locals will likely not miss though I doubt we are much a better replacement.   Emir Shuayb is a gallant and courageous fighter, he will not go down without a fight.  Convenient then, that he is not on Crete. The Hafsids are trying to extend their realm by conquering the other nearby island of Cyprus, waging a war with the newly independent Greek kingdom of Syria from which he will soon return.  We said goodbye to Holstein, barely a single season could pass before we came and left. A handful of local Saxons and Dutch warriors were willing to join us, but many of the Norsemen that joined us from Rogaland think us fools going off to die in a desert, and instead stay in the marshes of north Germania or depart from our fleet as we pass once more through the strait of Gibraltar, to make their fortune on the shores of Andalusia.  By the time the new year rolls around our ships are landing on the southern shores of the isle of Crete, there are no defenders to see us off beyond a handful of militia watching over the villages as we press onward toward Iraklio.  As we lay siege to the island's capital, the commanders bicker over whether we should be attempting to raid all the surrounding settlements or focus solely on the siege, some fear that splitting up our army will leave us at a disadvantage should (when) Emir Shuayb returns. We can do both however, if we have enough scouts keeping their eyes on the sea beyond the isle.  Within the fortnight Iraklio has fallen and though Shuayb is not present is family certainly is and they will prove valuable barging tokens in our negotiations.  The army begins the march westward to the other major settlement on the island Chania, when scouts hurriedly bring us reports of the Emir's ships sighted and closing in on the isle fast.  The Emir lands behind us, back beyond Iraklio most likely with the intention of recapturing the town and then catching us out in the open with Chania's garrison joining the fray in a pincer movement. We won't allow that to happen, instead I order the army to turn back and face Shuayb in the mountains while his soldiers are still finding their land legs after the journey from Cyprus.  Despite their numerical advantage and already having elements of their army in well defended positions in the mountains upon learning of our approach we manage to best Emir Shuayb; Ingjarldr, Askell and Játvarðr leading our warriors to glory.   Over the next month we chase the Emir's army across Crete as his forces dwindle by the day.    In the final bout, as the Emir's final soldiers made their last stand at his side, Játvarðr became just a little too tenacious and fought he alone could capture Shuayb and met his end. He has died a glorious death in the pursuit of our new home, and while he dines in the hall of Valhalla we will raise our horns of mead in his honour tonight.  Arechis comes of age, and puts to use what we have taught him as he has taken to the field in the final battle, not the greatest of warriors but then again I was nothing special when I first took up a sword to fight beside my father.  Emir Shuayb faces losing what little of his army remains and will have no way to defend his new holdings in Cyprus not to mention his family members in our care. He meets with me in the fields south of Iraklio and he cedes Crete to the Veisla Clan.   We have swapped Holstein for Crete and are one step closer to our final destination.  As well as losing Játvarðr in the final battle, the godi Valdemar passes away in his sleep a few short days later. Though he was hostile to me upon my initial seizure of Jæren he grew to respect and maybe even like me, and he believed in our dream of finding a new home on a foreign shore, he was born and lived in Rogaland most his life, he didn't have to join us on our adventure but chose to nonetheless, he too will be missed.  And 'luck' would have it, his successor Hemingr dislikes us just as much as Valdemar once did and he will require some convincing to come round to our way, the man thinks Crete is far enough and we ought to make our home on this island perfect for raiding and attacking the shores around us.  Already the local Greeks have begun petitioning me about all their woes, hoping that we may be more amicable overlords than the Emir. Our own attack on Chania has left the town's defences in a dire state and a delegation of the town's merchants have offered a small sum if I can put forward the rest and see to it that Chania is well defended once more. I say I will see to it that funds are allocated to the town, but of course the merchants' money will be of far more use in the next step of our adventure and with any luck we will be long gone by time our deception has been discovered.  To appease hofgodi Hemingr a raid is organised to go and plunder the Italian coast, where word has reached us of a floating city of merchants far north in the Adriatic Sea, Ingjarldr and Askell take a portion of the clan's warrior and sail off to the north.  Sultan Ahmad's power only continues to grow and now he has one of the largest armies in all the known world (is it possible he somehow knows of my plans for his realm?). Anything short of a colossal catastrophe hitting Egypt will leave the Sultan too formidable to face, and even then what condition would the land be in for us to rule over.  The dream of our home in the land of pharaohs feels like it is slipping away, but perhaps, a new hope lies just nearby.  With all the different possible plans for the final step of our adventure wearing heavy on our mind we decide to take a brief break with a hunting excursion into the mountains of Crete.  But the countryside is lousy with these Greek peasants, how can I expect to hunt anything with all these Christians ambling about the hillsides. I have the soldiers accompanying me on this excursion clear out the local forests and ensure the locals remain away, a few days without their mushrooms or berries or whatever it is they are picking in these forests won't hurt them.   The raiding party has returned from this floating city of merchants, 'Venice', they return with fewer men than they left and with not a single coin or trinket among them. Though they initially sailed in to the lagoon where the city is located and found success in blockading the central islands -  It turns out a city ran by rich and powerful merchant families is able to just conjure hordes of mercenaries with a click of their fingers and a jingle of their money purses. Gargantuan triremes crewed by hundreds of Lombard mercenaries beset our longships and our warriors that were in the city were forced to make a hasty retreat.  Though apparently Askell at one point found himself surrounded by the zealous son of Orso Participazio - ruler of Venice - and his elite guards, and against all odds Askell fell them all in a fit of fury and slew the patrician's haughty boy with his bare hands.  Morale amongst the clan is at an all time low, to our north the Greeks are in turmoil as a major faction seeks to break away from the empire, many are calling for us to stay here, on Crete as soon enough where one empire stood there will be many petty bickering kings and nobles, all ripe for plundering.  But this island is cursed, I am sure of it. That Emir called on his god to beset us with constant problems no matter how small or large and I am sure in time we will find our demise on this isle, we must return to the mainland soon. I swore back in Holstein that we would make our home in Egypt, and I will see it come true.  Tensions between the men are also beginning to rise and flare up into feuds and squabbles that we can all do without. Askell and Hjalmar have been at each other's throats for weeks ever since the raiding party returned from Venice, with the marshall saying things would have gone differently had he been there which led to Askell 'accidently' killing the marshal's dog on their hunting trip. They asked me to let them settle their dispute with a holmgang - a duel.  And like a fool I bet on Askell, tales of his bloody exploits in Venice still fresh in my mind. But who was to think he could best our dear old marshal, Hjalmar may be twice his age and almost twice his weight but he is a sly old thing and put the much younger though more bold Askell in his place.  In Iraklio I have been spending more nights frequenting this Greek excuse for a mead hall, and as of late spending those nights in the company of a wanderer by name of Ofeigr, a veteran raider who has taken up the more dull but questionably profitable life of being a merchant. He has heard of my desire to take a chunk out of Egypt and informs me that beyond the Sultanate of the Tulunids there lies an independent emirate, on the banks of a sea beyond the Mediterranean. It is technically part of Egypt though not part of the sultanate. In exchange for taking him into the clan he can tell us more.  I had pondered about the lands beyond the Sultanate, and the possibility of taking those, with the intention of coming back for Cairo another time. But the issue of just how we would get forty longships down the Nile without being stopped eluded me. Luck would have it then, Ofeigr tells me that Sultan Ahmad is preoccupied with fighting a popular uprising. It is not so large a rebellion that it has destabilised his realm so we may take Cairo, but we can at least sail down the Nile unopposed.  This may be the only chance I have, I gather the champions of clan Veisla in the town square of Iraklio, declaring our intention to finally end our adventure in the great and prosperous land of Egypt. We will leave at this time in one week, every last scrap of food and military supplies are to be loaded on the longships and any willing locals to join us, we will need as many as we can muster to hold our new home once we take it. The men are overjoyed, expecting us to soon be feasting in the great city of Cairo.  In spring of 880, forty longships sail from the great inland sea through the vast Nile Delta, where equally bemused and startled locals watch us drift past, as the axe wielding, fur-coat wearing strangers stare back from their dragon-headed ships.  There was indeed no opposition, we sail pass Cairo, and on the western banks, just above the rolling sand dunes we spy the tops of those 'man-made mountains', from here it is hard to judge just how tall they actually are, and despite most of the men wanting to disembark to get a closer look (and believing they are practically covered in loot just waiting for an eager viking to come along) I make them push on. We pass settlement after settlement, through the thick pockets of reeds and gazing in fear at the huge water horses and large flat scaly creatures that swim alongside our ships.  Ofeigr tells me we have gone far enough down the river, we will now have to venture east, until we get to the 'Red Sea'. It is good we are finally leaving the river, the men grow more restless and agitated with each settlement we pass, and there is increasing evidence of battles and pillaging around us, this popular uprising must not be far, which means the Sultan is surely close behind. The warriors, our retinue and councillors and all our followers are happy to finally be on land again, only to learn we must now haul the ships from the Nile and carry them with us, for an unknown number of miles through the blistering desert sun.  For three weeks we trek across the sand, pillaging every tiny town and farmstead unfortunate to be in our path for all the food and water they hold. And at night we arrange the longships in makeshift forts while we huddle for warmth around campfires and with ever depleting barrels of mead. We thankfully cross into the land of the Eastern Desert, where locals fleeing from the coast tell of an invasion, a different invasion than our own. Emir Hafiz ibn Abu Abdallah al-Umari, steward of the Eastern Deserts has enjoyed nominal independence from the Sultan of Egypt, but with Sultan Ahmad dealing with the uprising, the Eastern Desert has become a battleground between the Muslim faithful and encroaching Coptic Nubians from the south.  What a sight it must have been for those two enemy commanders, in the midst of their battle suddenly to see ships moving slowly over the sand dunes toward them, only for them to drop and come the wailing of horns and 1600 furious vikings come charging into the fray and massacre their armies equally.  Venting weeks of pent up frustration and agitation from the heat, the warriors are relentless and show no mercy to the defending Muslim and Copts, I make sure to quickly move across the battlefield until I locate Emir Hafiz and capture him alive. By the end of the battle, he is the only Arab still drawing breath.  We drag the Emir back to his capital and he convinces the garrison to open the gates, and we march into Qusayr, our new home. Our jewell on the coast of the Red Sea that now stretched out before us, where the longships are put back into the water.   The Emir is put on a boat and told to sail across the sea never to return, his rule over this land has ended. The Veisla Clan has finally found the place to establish it's permanent home.  The Jarldom of the Eastern Desert. 
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Feb 19, 2022 00:38
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IV - 881 - 888 - Salvation The Eastern Desert of Egypt, hugging the coastline of the Red Sea, is not the land of riches and greatness that I had promised the clan. This rugged mountainous land is inhospitable, devoid of any forests or verdant pastures; the only animals are the occasional herd of goats or aggressive horse-like creatures called camels.  The only major settlement for one hundred of miles around is Qusayr, the former hold of Emir Hafiz which is little more than a fishing village.  And the only source of groundwater is a place called Wadi Saqi, a shallow stream that is completely barren for half the year.  The only plus are the crumbling but still functional remnants left behind by some ancient empire, and much to our disbelief they were built by Romans. Even out here in the middle of nowhere, the influence of that old empire is still felt.  There is great dissent among the clan members, they had wanted us to charge up the banks of the nile and take Cairo for oursevles despite knowing how suicidal it was, or even just to stay in Crete rather than come to this dusty empty coast.  Ofeigr, the man who brought me here, who made this all possible I feel is the only one I can trust anymore. And I thank him the only way I can think of - by offering him my hand in marriage and allowing him to co-rule this new land we have conquered. And now that we are settled for good, despite how good or bad this place may be, I need to start thinking of children, if my legacy is to carry on.   To the south of the town is a region called Jabal Quzlum, even more desolate than this and it's local populace far from our control. Marshal Haraldr is sent with a small contingent of warriors to pacify the small settlements wherever they may lie.  While here in Qusayr, my steward Húnþjófr is working on trying to find some common ground between us and the natives, seeing as we will be ruling over them from now on and any distrust needs to be stamped out now.  Though we carried a great hoard of supplies and food with us from Crete down the River Nile and on our trek through the desert, already it is greatly depleted, I have attempted to make trade contacts with tribes and ports elsewhere along the Red Sea but they are not receptive to our kind at all, and the language barrier makes our friendly intentions hard to get across.  And the few we do end up working with only end up betraying that trust and making off with our 'exotic' northern goods.  Warriors and raiders are also disappearing from the town. On a survey of the surroundings a few miles from the town we come across a band of our warriors, making their way back through the desert toward Egypt proper. They have little to say to us, only that word has reached us that the 'oh so great and fearsome Cordoba Caliphate' that we dared not attacked has fractured and continues to face problems, meaning it should have been the location we had set sail for. And they would risk the journey back across the desert and through the Sultan's land if there was even a chance at making a new home there rather than stay here.  The clan is directionless, without purpose here. A war will focus everyone's minds and get them behind me once more. To our south sits the Hadariba tribe led by Emir Ali Baba, we have fought much worse and came out unscathed, we must expand to survive here and going south is our only option.  While supplies and gold are allocated to the upcoming war, some is also put aside to ensure our new home can be protected. Emir Asif resided in a dilapidated crumbling castle built centuries ago, it will not do to make such a sorry building my home.  Local carpenters and labourers overseen by steward Húnþjófr begin work on renovating and expanding the old ruin into a proper Northern fort.  Mid-autumn 882 we march to war once more, to double the size of our new realm and help secure our place here.   We land on the shores of Aydhab, where we find no defending army, only locals who desperately try to hold us back but to no avail.  The town falls within a week, but we cannot consider victory here until Ali Baba has been defeated lest his army retake our new claim. The locals say he fled south with the tribe's warriors when word of our attack reached them. Then south we march.   I have never before felt the bitter sting of defeat nor do I wish to feel it again. Ali Baba had spent the weeks that we were sieging his town preparing for our arrival in the mountains. His men are used to this oppressive heat, this rugged terrain and they ran circles around us, hitting our flanks and disappearing beyond ravines and hills again.  Ingjarldr was heavily injured.  Haraldr is maimed.  Askell died in battle.  Our 'easy victory' against these southern tribes is dashed. We slink away again to the north, to recuperate in the captured town of Aydhab and prepare for a possible counter-attack by the Emir.  As we crest the mountain range south of Aydhab and see the town before us, we spot an army three times our size sieging our prize. While we fought the Emir in the mountains, another of his enemies marched along the coast and will now steal away all that should rightfully be ours. We head directly east, taking the shortest route to the coast where we can see our longships already approaching - having fled from Aydhab when the large army appeared.  As we hastily re-embark on the longships I recognized one that did not join us in this war and was to stay behind in Qusayr to protect the harbour from any attacks. The ship pulls up beside us as we push off from the shore and the captain hops over to ours, his face racked with worry, and when he utters the next words I know why. Egypt has declared war on us.  This war in the south means nothing if we risk losing everything back in Qusayr. How many soldiers has the Sultan? Thousands? Tens of thousands? We are but a few hundred.  The longships arrive back in town to find it mostly deserted. Only the brave or stupid remain. To the west Sultan Ahmad is crossing the mountains and fast approaching. Those that remain are not perturbed, they know they will meet their end here on these shores against the Sultan but they will die 'a glorious death' and be welcomed into Valhalla.  This isn't how I wanted it to end though. I didn't come all this way to just die on this dusty shore for nothing. Everything I have worked for is slipping away. Everyone who stood beside me is gone.  I have nothing left.  In the harbour sits a foreign boat that arrived sometime while we were battling in the south, a merchant's longship from a foreign clan that for some reason has not fled with the impending massacre approaching. The days preparing our doomed defence become too much and I march down to the docks to demand to know why this foolish merchant has not sailed away to safety. His attire is nothing like ours but his complexion and fair hair betray his look, he was born in the north just like us.  "Why have you not sailed away from this place, merchant, there is no more trading to be done in this place lest you seek to pick our bones clean of trinkets and weapons when the Sultan has finished with us. Assuming he does not kill you too" "I fear not the Sultan, Jarl Alva. Nor any muslim warrior or chietan in this land. I follow their ways." "You forsake the Gods?" "The Old Gods have no place here, there is but one God, and his name is Allah." There is a terrible knot in my stomach, I gaze back across the town, to the distant mountains where Sultan Ahmad will soon appear. "Will converting save my people?" "Maybe. But if you are not sincere I am sure the Sultan will see right through you, and send you to Allah personally so the great one can devise an even worse punishment." "The Gods have brought me nothing, I made my own luck, I won all my great victories with my own hand, and now they abandon me to die on this shore. If accepting this Allah brings salvation, then so be it, I am ready to believe" "I have a Quran on my ship, and we haven't much time. Come Jarl, we'll save your eternal soul so you may your people"  In a dry mountain pass where the Sultan's army is cresting one of the last major ridgelines before coming upon Qusayr a lone Norseman on a horse approaches, steward Húnþjófr (the only one of us who has managed to learn Arabic by working with the locals so much) Húnþjófr is surrounded by Egyptian Faris and brought before the austere Egyptian ruler who looks down on the Norseman with disdain. "You're a long way from home, barbarian. Come to beg for your life? Or just to buy enough time for your people to escape?" "No. I simply come before you, Sultan, to inform you that you may not wage war on our people" Sultan Ahmad grips the hilt of his sword tightly, looking like he could cut down the steward with one swift slice. "And why, pray tell, would that be? I have ten thousand soldiers and the will of Allah behind me, I will drive you heathens from our shores and restore order to my borders. "Well, that's just it, Sultan. You may not wage holy war against fellow followers of the faith" The Sultan shoots a look of confusion to one of his generals, before he is consumed with a different type of anger. He pinches his nose and through gritted teeth utters "Are you testing me, lord?" He motions to his generals and they ride off to their various regiments. "Fine. Fine. Then take me to your 'Jarl'."  For the next few days Bergþór taught me everything he could and read to me pages over and over again from his holy book. Much of it he had memorised in fact, and the old man tried as hard as he could to part much of the wisdom he had gained on to me. He taught me of the struggles and triumphs of the prophet muhammad, of the five pillars of Islam by which I must live my life and to dispell all I had known and held dear about Odin, Thor, Tyr and all the Old Gods of our far away homeland. There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his messenger.  "And what of you, Bergþór? How is it you have come to find yourself on our shores in such trying times?" The merchant smiled "You are far from the first to come to the Red Sea, Alva. I was born in Jylland, yes, but it is Persia I call my home now. In the court of Sigurd Ragnarsson. I and many others accompanied him on the great journey from Daneland, but not west, to join his brothers in Britain, he had no desire to go where others of our kind had already tread well enough. Returning warriors who had served in the Varangian Guard told tales of Persia, of Anatolia and the Levant, places we could scarcely imagine, and so he went east. He took us past Novgorod and through the many rivers of the land of the Rus until we came to a great sea by the name of the Caspian. We traded with Turks and Khazar on the coasts and sailed until we could sail no more, having reached Persia. We abandoned the longships, sold them or dismantled them and we continued on foot through the desert, until we came upon a great battle between what we now know are the Abbasids and Saffarids. Sigurd made a calculated decision and waited until the battle was at it's apex and we entered the fray, saving Amir-e Amiran Ya'qub of the Saffarids, who in return allowed us to settle on the coast of the Persian Gulf. Perso-Norse culture is now flourishing beneath Sigurd though he himself has not yet shown willingness to forgo the old ways, many of us have found a new calling in words of the prophet. But, enough distractions now. You have more to learn yet..."  At the half-constructed longhouse outside the old crumbling castle overlooking Qusayr, Sultan Ahmad and a hundred of his most loyal and decorated soldiers arrive (whom they alone could probably take this town). I await inside alone, only the Sultan enters and Húnþjófr so he may translate, though I could quite easily infer from the Sultan's tone what this was going to be about. "What trick do you play on me, heathen?"  "No trick. I have no love for the Gods of my people, I never really have. I have spent all my life raiding and ransacking, taking what wasn't mine and killing everyone who stood in my path. And it has cost me everything. Everyone who believed in me has died, everything I ever earned honestly lost to me. "I have heard tales of the 'great' Alva of the Veisla clan, scourge of the north. You even raided Alexandria many moons past. But all I see before me now is a sorry mouse who mistook herself for a lion. I have fought your people many times now, you come and go, pillaging as you please, but you are normally gone in a few weeks. Yet you have persisted like an illness that will not pass here in the Eastern Desert for the better part of two years." "I only wanted a home for my people, a place for us to prosper. And now we are but a few hundred huddled here on this forsaken shore."  "Tell me, Alva, did you mean to take my throne? And find yourself having to settle for this scrap of sand" I feel my throat tighten and my mouth is unbearably dry as I nod and utter a meek "Yes." "And would you still? Given the chance" "Yes." The Sultan smirked for a moment at my honest answer before he began to slowly pace around me, dismissively looking around at our sorry excuse for a great hall. "I am not a native of this land either. I was born a Turk, and sold as a mamluke - a slave warrior to the Abbasids. One of their best, they sent me to be governor of Egypt, and when I saw my chance, I simply took it." I listen along intently, furrowing my brow at this revelation that I and the Sultan are not too dissimilar. "You will never take my throne, Alva. While I draw breath no foreign banner will fly over Cairo. I am the first independent ruler of Egypt since Cleopatra, you probably don't know who she was, and I have amassed the largest army in all the Mediterranean to ensure my realm remains free and prosperous." The Sultan folded his arms, looking down at me, I had never felt smaller in my life and were Ingjarldr still alive he would have killed me where I stood for grovelling so before a foreign ruler.  "All the while the Umayyads buckle under the weight of local uprisings in Iberia and the Abbasids are rapidly losing control of the Levant. Egypt alone will soon stand as the great power in our world, you can either help me see Egypt remains strong and prestigious. Or you can die right here."  "Am I to be your vassal?" "No. The previous arrangement I held with Emir Hafiz will now be transferred to you. You will protect my eastern shore from raiders and from Arabian incursion, and in return you are free rule this land, rule it as a muslim not a heathen. Do not mistake my compassion and kindness for weakness. Should this turn out to be some form of deception, I will return Alva. I will destroy your clan, and no matter how I will find a way to destroy where ever it is you came from."  The Sultan departs again and I resign myself to the half-complete longhouse for the next few days. My days of conquering are over, I now only wish to care for what of my people remain and make something of this land.   With Haradlr gone, and Hjalmar without the use of one of his legs, he is in no position to be marshal of the clan or Qusayr, and so it falls to Arechis of all people.  Along with Hjalmar he is one of the last few people still remaining with me from when we departed Rogaland - and he was not even a native of our land. Most of the people here are warriors and followers we picked up in Holstein, in Crete and on our many raids, many thralls we were forced to give freedom. I asked Arechis why he had not left us, now that he easily could. "And go where?" He responded "Back to a home you took me from that I can barely remember, to a father that will disinherit me when he learns I have forsaken Christ and God for your Odin, which you could not even have the decency to die for. Leave me to train the men Alva, maybe next time a foe comes we will actually fight and not throw ourselves at their feet."  Bergþór offered to stay in Qusayr, now that Ingjarldr was dead who primarily was meant to be our physician, but did far more maiming than healing. Bergþór says he has spent time in Baghdad and is an experienced surgeon and healer. He departs for a few weeks and then returns with a whole host of Perso-Norse companions eager to work in Qusayr and aid another fledging Norse realm here in the Arab world. Ehsan Azizsson is my new holyman, a Mufti, he calls himself. Though his father came from Daneland he was born in Persia and beyond his light skin has little of the North left in him. He is more agreeable at least then my old Hofgodi.  The first test of my new faith comes when local villages decry one of our seiðr of witchcraft. Everything she does is completely normal back in the north, but the villagers of Jabal Quzlum believe all their woes are down to her, and demand I kill her at once. I have known Sif for many years, she accompanied us from Rogaland. Her wailing and pleading almost break me but I fight through the hesitation and order her execution. If it is for Allah, it is right.  Luck finally begins to turn in our favour, as while sailing out near the waters of Qusayr we spot a whale, a creature I had not seen since departing the frozen northern shores.  We managed to bring the beast down and hauled it back to shore, where it's meat could feed the town for weeks and all it's bone and blubber to find various uses with the craftsmen of the town.  Curiously, my Mufti does not actually speak Arabic as the locals and Sultan Ahmad did, but Iranian, language of Persia from where he hails. Well, I know neither Arabic or Iranian, and no Quran exists in Norse. If I am to be able to read my own holy book without someone looking over my shoulder telling me the words I must learn one of these tongues at least.  It has been three years since we came to his land, there is some semblance of normalcy beginning to develop. And I am with child.  Bergþór has been acting as a mediator between the town and any Arabic traders and travellers that frequent the settlement. He has taken great joy in watching me trying, and mostly succeeding, to better this town and make something of it. He is a better conversationalist than Ehsan, who has no knowledge of our homeland or our old ways. While Bergþór has become very accustomed to this place he is not afraid of the occasional flyte or riddle.  Though sometimes I feel like he just lets me win so I feel good.  Renovation and expansion of the ancient fort is finished, and now a proper Norse longhouse sits over it.    We quickly learned however that these palm trees are not quite as versatile as the great pines back home, they are porous and bends easily in strong winds. What's more the thatched roofs from palm leaves and reeds can make the interiors unbearably hot. A local source of high quality stone is needed if we are to make more suitable permanent structures, and a quarry is drawn up to be commenced nearby.  In the Autumn of 884 I give birth to a healthy strong young boy. I had fought a life fighting on battlefields and the injuries I had sustained and healed from would prepare me for childbirth, but I was wrong. But dear Ofeigr was there to help through. We named our boy Gormr, meaning 'Glory to God'.  I question some of the literature Ehsan has me reading, perhaps it is a test I wonder. They are nonetheless, rather lurid pieces of writing, and only half way through reading one out loud in the longhouse in my terribly broken Iranian do I realise what it is I am reading when my nearby servants all chortle and blush. They mock me, I'll see how they laugh after I have them whipped.  There are an increasing number of fellow Norsemen that frequent our shores, but they have never attacked, merely pass by or stop for brief trading. The exploits of Sigurd, and maybe myself but probably not, have inspired a great deal of adventurers back home, who haul their boats across the narrow Sinai and into the Red Sea where they can raid and conquer the coasts of Arabia and even as far as the little known land of the Hindus. In Safaga, a small coastal town north of Qusayr we had stopped at a large tavern for the night which was overburdened with lively Norsemen old and young. The vigmen are inexperienced but eager, employing them would be useless as they would just seek new shores for adventures, but the Huscarls are grizzled and done with travelling, they just want a place to settle and be paid for the occasional bout. And we do need more capable warriors back in Qusayr.  Returning to Qusayr we find Hjalmar is once again locked in a fierce feud with another of my champions, and yet again demands a holmgang to settle the dispute. Everyone thinks I am mad to bet in favour of Hjalmar, the old cripple as he is unfortunately becoming known as.  But I remember the last time I bet against the old warrior, even with one leg he somehow manages to best Áli.  The nearby Sheikh Nasir in the bordering Egyptian province has been a bad influence on the local populace here, many think it wrong to serve beneath a foreigner, and a woman at that. There is even talk of trying to petition Nasir to conduct an expedition into the Eastern Desert to liberate the 'downtrodden' Egyptians who I have only tried to help. I may have forsaken my faith, but I am still a proud Norse woman, perhaps it's time I impart on the locals the virtues of our ways rather than trying to kowtow to them.   Gormr is growing up fast and he already has plenty of his mother in him, or the greater adventurer I used to be. Hopefully the world will not drag him back down too quickly.  A travelling merchant stops in Qusayr (we had rather been hoping to become a stopping point for ships travelling up to Quzlum, not far from Cairo, but many just sail right past us), and comes to me directly, offering a book he claims will help me with my attempts at learning the Iranian language. His father supposedly frequented these lands long before even the great Sigurd came to settle in Persia, and written in his book is the key to learning the language with ease. I made a deal and got the book at a far cheaper price than the merchant was offering.  It seems though, the book is actually quite handy and I find within many phrases and words that help me. In fact, I feel with this manual I am becoming so confident in my use of the Iranian tongue that I may partake in something I have been meaning to ever since converting.  Completing the Hajj is one of the five pillars expected of me, and now that I don't feel completely lost trying to communicate with the locals I feel I can finally undertake the journey to Mecca. Of course, they speak Arabic there but my hope is there will be enough Iranian speakers that I can still get by.  Mself, Ofeigr, Gormr (though I hear he will have to perform the Hajj again under his own volition as an adult) and a handful of followers depart from Qusayr in late 887, travelling west in to Qus and then skirting the banks of the Nile all the way in to Egypt. Only when we cross the Sinai Peninsula and Arabia proper do we begin to face hardship, and our numbers dwindle. But we press on, we will reach Mecca inshallah.  We reach the holy city by new year and with Ofeigr we conduct all the rites of pilgrimage. It feels good, to have done this, like a great weight has been lifted from me. I can feel a closer connection with Allah than I did with any of the Old Gods.   On the return journey we make sure to stop at Cairo and request an audience with Sultan Ahmad, I am glad to meet the ruler of Egypt again under more amicable circumstances.  We talk at length; about Qusayr and improvements I have made and how I have tried to help local Egyptians, the state of Egypt and ever growing army and wealth the Sultan has at his disposal, but mostly about my own progress with our shared faith, which Ahmad is only more than pleased to learn how far I have come.  I propose a marriage between Gormr and one of his daughters, to secure the blossoming new friendship between our two houses and, to my surprise the Sultan agrees, my little Gormr will marry a princess, and with that ensure Egypt never marches on us again.    Despite the disaster of our initial arrival in this place, over the past seven years we have recovered and rebuilt, the Eastern Desert now boasts the largest army on the shores of the Red Sea (far more than any of the Sultan's own vassals) and we actually have deterred any raiders from attacking Egypt from the south or the Red Sea. Sultan Ahmad thinks it no longer fitting that our realm simply be known as 'The Eastern Desert'. He has referred to our kind as the Nurmans, and so he proclaims us Nurmandiya.  Nurmandiya, a name I can be proud of. In a short time we have already begun heavily adopting many of the local's traditions, and they in turn some of ours.  The Egyptians of Qusayr and us Norse who come to rule them are becoming ever closer by the day, and perhaps it's time to stop denying that in no short time at all the lines between our people will blur entirely.          From this day forth the Eastern Desert shall be known as Nurmandiya. And with friendship secured with the Sultan I feel reinvigorated, we have our home and it is safe, but I still desire a throne of my own.   Veisla Clan, 888 Crisis Now fucked around with this message at 11:37 on Feb 21, 2022 |
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Feb 21, 2022 00:35
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GunnerJ posted:One of the hallmarks of a Crisis Now LP is rolling with weird situations and making them work. We may be able to regain them with reforming cultures down the line. I had to be strategic with what I picked and wanted a good mix of Norse-Egyptian.
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Feb 21, 2022 02:23
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V - 888 - 898 - Ratu Layung For a decade now we have ruled the Eastern Deserts of Egypt, now named Nurmandyia since solidifying our rule and gaining the Sultan's favour. The towns of Qusayr, Safaga and North / Central Jabal Quzlum are at peace, and as prosperous as they can be in this remote desert. Though try as we might, the woes and tribulations of these simple townsfolk once again begin to weigh down on me.  Not that they know it thankfully, we do our dutiful best to listen to them and help where we can.  While the local Egyptians still consider me a foreigner they at least are no longer hostile, and with luck our new joint Nurman culture will flourish in time.  With a small band of my councillors and warriors we take a journey to Jabal Quzlum that lies south of Qusayr, a few dozen miles inland from the coast and up winding mountain passes. Here our influence is not as well felt as on the coast and the locals are more resistant to my rule.  Mayor Njáll is my representative here, a convert to Islam like myself which has helped him keep peace here far from the capital, which is lucky as he has just twenty five huscarls at his disposal to keep order. He is more popular here it seems than myself, as the Mayor holds constant festivals and celebrations for every little thing the town achieves and ensures spirits are high at all times. He insists we take a hunting trip in the mountains nearby and I feel inclined to agree.      We press on, further south to the castle of South Jabal Quzlum, at the fringes of Nurmandyia. Outside the gates I come across a small bazaar set up by local Egyptians who have travelled in from the surrounding hamlets upon hearing the Jarl was visiting, hoping to hawk their wares. One in particular 'Hussayn' talks my ear off for more than an hour, and I do actually learn some things about stewardship I hadn't considered. But much to his disappointment I depart with his knowledge but none of his goods.  The castle is held by Skúli Stjarna, a peculiar but resourceful old man who has been with us since Rogaland, for the past two years he has acted as my spymaster. Despite the fact he never leaves his castle except to make the occasional journey up to Safaga (for it's brothel I should add), he has a vast network of spies and informants and seems to know the current events of the surrounding areas more than anyone.  In the west, across our new home continent, local tribes and clans are banding together and attempting to reform their faiths in light of Muslim conquests. There is word that back in our old homeland, Sverige has been united under the banner of Clan Munso, who also seeks to reform the Asatru faith, but not because of foreign incursions, quite the opposite. The Norse are becoming so spread out across Midgard that King Eririkr fears many will start abandoning the Old Gods for local ones (who would do such a thing?), and has no desire to see once proud Norsemen fall to 'false gods'.  Across the Red Sea, and the Abbasids continue to lose their grip on the Levant. The Caliph has been moved from Baghdad to Damascus and struggles to fend off the Armenians from the north, Nestorians who have control of seized the Mesopotamia rivers, and the Orthodox Syrian Coast that makes constant battle against the Caliphate with Byzantine support. Not to mention, the sudden and alarming rise of the Nasrid Sultanate. Sultan Ya'qub or more commonly referred to as 'The Warmongering Giant' proclaims himself custodian of the holy cities of Mecca and Medina and the Holy Land, and seems to exist in a perpetual state of war with the other tribes of Arabia.  And at the other end of the Mediterranean? Well the Umayyads fare no better, Cordoba is desperately trying to maintain order while many of the emirs feel they can rule the lands of Andalusia themselves without the Umayyad's 'protection' and guiding hand. The Catholics in the north of Iberia are pressing down, and from the south, Haraldr Yngling has conquered Marrakesh and formed a Norse-Maghreb kingdom and plunders the shores of Iberia and southern Francia. The Franks themselves face endless internal strife, and revolts. We are lucky to have Sultan Ahmad as our friend, as he does not make false boats of having the largest and most stable realm in all the known land, Egypt is a beacon in these trying times.  Skúli is also eager to tell me that Chief Ali Baba of Naqis to the south of us has died, and that the mountains of Naqis where so many of our kind were killed has now been incorporated into the greater Kingdom of Nubia, against the wishes of local tribal chiefs who are proving a major issue for King Zakharias. It would be unfortunate for him should a rival army choose to invade them at this time.  Despite his resourcefulness and commitment to helping me and the realm, Skúli is still a practising Asatru, with no inclination of ever accepting the word of the Prophet. Though he understands the increased obligations and taxes I put on South Jabal Quzlum have been done so under pressure of the council back in Qusayr, I make sure Skúli knows his work is still appreciated with a slight under the table donation to his fortress.  Returning from the trip to the mountains, I spy a Perso-Norse merchant vessel docked in Qusayr and race down to the waterside, excited to try my hand at speaking Iranian to them. The merchant becomes incensed and spits at the ground, and in Norse he barks "Terrible. And it's called Farsi!". Ah, to hell with this nonsense.  Arechis is nowhere to be found in town, I quickly learn that he has returned to his homeland. Prince Guaifer of Salerno has died and with that Arechis inherited the County of Palermo, the old Prince never gave up hope that his son would return one day and never excluded him from his inheritance despite having no idea his condition or whereabouts.  A envoy was able to gain passage with a viking expedition and through them learned of Arechis' location and made his way to Qusayr while we were in the mountains. Upon learning from the envoy that he was now a count, and that a castle awaited him back in Sicily, Arechis was apparently gone in only a matter of hours.  While his father never gave up on him, his numerous siblings were none to pleased to see their long lost brother return, following the wrong faith and ill-equipped to deal with life back in the Christian world. He died only weeks after arriving back in his homeland, almost certainly killed by one of his own brothers. I am sorry Arechis.  The quarry just outside of Qusayr is complete, and with it building materials are now more readily available rather than us having to rely on trade from Egypt or the local inadequate timber.  Qusayr is growing, merchants and travellers are becoming ever more frequent, the roads are safe, the coasts have never known a raid since I took this land and thanks to the work of my council gold is flowing into the region rather than just sailing past each day.  Qusayr may not be much, but it is mine. Prosperous, peaceful, our oasis on the turbulent Red Sea.  It could all be so much more. I have never forgotten my dream. I swore I would have a throne, I left Rogaland knowing I would either find my death or forge my kingdom. My quest for greatness will never fade, not while my heart still beats. In the summer of 892 I travelled to Cairo to meet with Sultan Ahmad. I make clear my intention to form a kingdom out of Nurmandiya, to seize all the coast of the Red Sea and drive the heathen Copts out from the mountains I had tried and failed to conquer all those years ago. Should he march at my side with the armies of Egypt he will have a permanent friend in the Nurmans, he will have secured the southern and eastern flanks of his realm and shown the world the might of Egypt's military.   After departing Cairo I head further north, back to the Mediterranean for the first time in many years. To Alexandria to meet with Captain Aaron of the 'Keepers of the Lighthouse' a mercenary leader with a thousand cataphracts at his command. I inform him of my plan to conquer the Red Sea, and in return for his services I offer almost all the money Qusayr has at it's disposal.  Ironically he himself was Coptic, but gold it seems had greater sway with him than God.  I ride back south along the banks of the Nile with the Keepers of the Lighthouse following, Sultan Ahmad had gathered the forces of Cairo and was now mustering the Emirs of Egypt to join him on the southern reaches of the Sultanate. In Qusayr I gather all the warriors of the Veisla Clan, the old veterans still clinging on from the Rogaland days, the handful of Saxon and Greek followers we gained on the way, and a huge army of local levies motivated by promises of gold and greatness, marching with the Sultan and seeing the Copts driving from rightful Muslim land. Allahu Akbar.   ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ The Baqt is one of the longest lasting treaties in the world. An agreement between the Muslims of Egypt and Coptics of Nubia that the two should never go to war, made in the times of the Rashidun Caliphate, when Arabs first conquered Egypt. It had ensured security and prosperity for the two peoples. Alva Veisla destroyed that peace. With one action she became one of the most reviled and abhorred figures in the history of the Nubian, Beja and Copt peoples. The pale skin barbarian that descended on their land from a frozen hell they could barely fathom, who had seduced the Sultan of Egypt and turned his heart to malice. They called her 'Ratu Layung' - The Crimson Queen - for the distinctive red cloak and hood she wore, but more precisely for the amount of blood she shed, rumoured to have turned the Nile itself red. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________  Excerpts from Alfutuhat Alhamra' - "Red Conquest" a journal kept by Kolbeinn Ålgård, Huscurl of Alva Veisla, written in Arabic and later translated to English. The Nile still looked as mesmerising as I remember it all those years ago, perhaps it is just the tales told of this ancient river that stirred the heart so, but gazing up on it feels different from the years I have spent looking upon the Red Sea from the shores of Safaga. We had been camped on the edge of the flood plains beside the banks of the river for a week, when the Sultan of Egypt finally arrived I (and many of the other warriors who had stuck with Alva all this way) was almost dumbfounded at the sight of the Egyptian army. I had never seen so many people before, nevermind some of the most disciplined and well equipped soldiers I had ever set eyes on, marching so perfectly in their columns. To think we would have almost faced this ourselves a decade ago, had the Jarl not saved us. Had she not brought the light of Allah in to our lives. In April of 893 we marched from Egyptian land into Nubian, two great armies flanking both sides of the Nile. Many in the border regions had already fled, they had seen our army and the Alexandrian mercenaries the Jarl had hired camped out and waiting. Some thought that we were it, that the two thousand of us was the 'great army' coming to take their land, and King Zakharias would come by any day to sweep as away. And so they stayed, only when the Sultan and his grand army arrived did they realise it was too late for them to go anywhere now. We advanced like a plague of locusts from the times of the Prophet Moses, but the Nubian people were our fields of crops to be felled.  Kalabsha fell in a matter of days. I thought I knew what devastation was, I figured the time I had spent in my previous life, before coming to this land and converting, as a viking, had prepared me for the worst humanity could inflict. But we razed Kalabsha and Sabagura and left none alive. The Jarl did not even care to take the treasures that lie in the holds of the local lords, she simply wanted to inflict the most suffering on King Zakharias' realm as possible to force his swift surrender. It would not be swift, and many more would suffer yet.  We progressed further down the Nile, sacking and destroying everything that stood in our path. Every great town, every tiny insignificant farmstead, they all burned just the same.   By mid-summer we had not seen sight of the Nubian army, suspecting they perhaps were holding in the capital and fortifying their position for our approach, but scouts brought word that the Nubians had been spotted in the mountains to the east, attempting to flank us and attack Nurmandiya. And so we departed from the banks of the Nile, once more heading into Naqis, where we had seen the terrible defeat after our first landing on these shores.   In Aydhab, the Nubian Kingdom's one and only coastal province since their acquisition of the tribal lands, they had been attempting to put together a rudimentary navy to sail up the Red Sea and either siege Qusayr or land close to Cairo. We quickly moved to seize the coast, the small villages here looking much the same as the last time we stepped foot in this land. The port was taken with ease and the Nubian boats torched.  With overland routes into Numandyia and Egypt blocked, and with the Nubian army now trapped in Suakin they had no choice but to come back north and face us.  Once again, we found ourselves facing insurmountable odds, but the Jarl did not falter. We held out ground. God is with us, she would remind us. Fourteen thousand Nubian soldiers bared down on us and with the cataphracts of the Keepers of the Lighthouse she rode head first into the fray.  God is with us, yes. And Egypt.  We watched as thousands of Sultan Ahmad's men came pouring into the Odib Valley like water cascading over falls, the Nubian army was completely surrounded, cut off. Only those that fled the moment Ahmad arrived lived, those that stood to face the Egyptians all died.  A great blow had been dealt to the Nubian Kingdom, but still King Zakharias refused to surrender.  And so the Jarl sought to 'meet' the King in person, to force his surrender.  Dongola was only a few centuries old, built around a great fortress and throne hall for the kings of Nubia. It was here that the Nubians held off the Rashidun Caliphate and formed the peace that had lasted until our conquest.  Jarl Alva vowed to burn the city to the ground. Nearby lords rose up, not against us, but against the King to try and end his madness. Meanwhile the people living along the Nile were beginning to form ad-hoc militias to try and keep order in their communities, they began waging war on anything that approached them, be it Nubian or Egyptian.   At the beginning of the summer of 896 we breached the walls of Dongola. And the Jarl was true to her word. Little of the city remained by the end of the day, those lucky enough to not be slaughtered were instead enslaved, to be sent to Qusayr or Cairo. King Zakharias was left with nothing, his kingdom shattered, his people rising up against him and his lords now clamouring for his throne.  The defeat in Naqis we had suffered all those years ago had been avenged. But, Alva was not satisfied yet.  She met with Captain Aaron once more, after the Sack of Dongola had concluded, there was a new target. She would need more land, more power if she was to realise her goal. And so the conquest continued.   While Sultan Ahmad continued to plunder the land of the Nubians, to so weaken them that a counter-attack would be impossible, we marched back across the mountains of Naqis - our mountains now, and we engaged the warriors of the Atbai Tribe, and left none standing.  Suakin fell, and with it Numandyia grew yet again.   But this was still not enough for the Jarl. She was like a woman possessed, driven by a single goal - of forging her kingdom.  The Adamites of Bazin were particularly wicked people, who lived without God, without laws and without their clothes. They believed themselves to be like Adam, without sin, and therefore anything they do is inherently without sin, as they claim to not know neither good nor evil. We would show them the error of their ways.  Sultan Ahmad rejoined us, having thoroughly destroyed Nubia and the will of it's people to ever raise arms against Egypt. Together we landed in Bazin in late spring 897.  The Jarl did not bother trying to capture or occupy the city, claiming it had no worth, a place so utterly debased by the sins of those who lived here it would simply be easier to burn it to the ground and start again.  To the south, the heathens had amassed, hoping to retake what little remained of the north of their realm, but with the Sultan at our side we engaged them, and slaughtered them like cattle.    ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Seven years. Seven years of blood and ash. I have swept through the lands of Nubia and and down the coast of the Red Sea like a scythe, cutting down all that stood before us and cementing my rule of this land.  I am exhausted, but relieved that at long last the moment I have been waiting for my whole life is about to come true. The great hoard of wealth and plunder taken from the Copts is brought back to Qusayr and the captured are given one last chance to buy their freedom before being shipped off to Cairo slave markets.  Qusayr is nice, but it is no place to proclaim yourself a queen. As we ride with the Sultan and the Egyptian army back to Cairo, he makes preparations for the celebrations of our victory to be held, and the Inauguration.  Before all the emirs and sheikhs of Egypt and visiting envoys of the Sultanates of Africa and Arabia, I am proclaimed Queen Alva. Queen of all the Nurmans.    House Veisla, 898 Crisis Now fucked around with this message at 21:29 on Feb 22, 2022 |
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Feb 22, 2022 19:57
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Gantolandon posted:I've never seen the choice between occupying and sacking the city. Is that from a mod? From Sinews of War, the only major gameplay changing mod I'm using.
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Feb 22, 2022 21:43
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Map of the Kingdom of Nurmandiya and it's constituent settlements. Map of Viking expansions by the year 900. (open in new tab)  Xelkelvos posted:If we don't take Egypt, I think taking the western side of the Red Sea and possibly the entirety of the Bab-el-Mandeb would be a strong consolation. Idk if there's actually a mechanical benefit for it, but it'll still be cool. There is a strait-crossing there, but with the ability now for any army to embark / disembark anywhere they've lost their importantance quite a bit.
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Feb 25, 2022 00:54
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Nick Buntline posted:so wait, was this not the result of the mod or GM fiat. it's because of the game rules I set at the start. Viking invasions have been set to "apocalyptic", and diplomatic range (for everyone) is unlimited
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Feb 25, 2022 08:25
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Given they've already reached Myanmar by 900, it's safe to assume in this world there are longships that have sailed down the Yangtze.
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Feb 25, 2022 22:20
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VI - 898 - 906 - Alva the Great (western) World in 898 Now that I have a kingdom of my own, I have my own court and the responsibilities and bonuses that come with it. The longhouse we built is simply not suitable for this environment, perhaps we can build another in time, but for now we have relocated to the old fortress just beside and renovated it the best we could.  Before I can see to attending my court or the matters that plague all my new subjects, it would be wise to straighten out the succession for my realm.  Back in the old homeland, great chieftains were elected by all in the clan, I see no reason why we cannot emulate that system here again. Thankfully there is unanimous support for my boy Gormr to become King when I finally shuffle off into paradise.   But now to the matters of our court.  Our court is warlike, we are a warlike-people. We took this land by force and we will defend it by force. And considering we are not the largest, or richest, or the most powerful realm, having a highly trained and disciplined core of professional soldiers will suite us best.  The more grandeur our court can acquire, the greater will we be in the eyes of our peers, friend and enemy alike. The more prestigious our court, the more we can offer, the more likely we are to see people of great renown flocking to serve us. Right now, things could be better to say the least, and we hold no great treasure or artefacts to our name.   From what we can tell, on the 'world stage' we rank similarly as all the other great norse adventurers who have forged their own realms - the Danelaw in Britain under Halfdan Ragnarsson, the shieldmaiden bandit-kingdom of the 'great and terrible' Gryla of Mann, and Harald 'Tanglehair' of the Nordic-African coast.  Well we have a long way to go before the great kings and emperors of the world see us as their equal, at least we have Egypt with us, for now we can try to make ourselves appear a little more 'civilised' and increase our amenities.  If we are to acquire (and mantain) any great artifacts we will require an antiquarian, and I can think of no better person than Bergþór, he has travelled far and wide, with immense connections to Norse, Muslim and Christian realms a like thanks to his merchant past before settling here in Qusayr.  And if there's one thing a Queen needs, it's a crown.   Within just three short weeks, a metalsmith arrives at the Qusayr docks, another Norseman who found the light of Allah, though be it a slightly different interpretation. He hails from Oman, where the Lusakaupangr clan have made Muscat a prosperous hub for Norse-adventurers in the seas beyond Arabia.  In order to further solidify my relation with Sultan Ahmad, without whom none of this would have been possible and for whose mercy I still stand when he could have taken Qusayr, I can think of nothing better than dedicating the very symbol of all we have achieved together in his name.  Zahra, who was just a tavern wench in Jæren when she departed Rogaland with us, has risen to become our stewards and rule our port town of Safaga. She turned the tiny fishing village into a bustling town where merchants and nordic adventurers alike are now frequently stopping at before progressing back inland to find business and mercenary opportunities in Egypt. She herself has become quite rich from running the town and wishes only to help see the realm prosper too, contributing much to the court in these first few burgeoning years.  At last we have our crown, it is nothing spectacular, but it is mine, a crown fit for a queen.   With that very important matter dealt with, it was now time to hold my first court.   The southern fringes of our new kingdom are still fraught with unrest, our army and the Egyptians were not merciful to the Adamite heretics that held sway over the land, but the majority of the people left behind are now just Copts. The huscurl I elevated to a count to oversee the county has seemingly forgotten we are no longer at war with these people and treats them like our enemy and not my subjects. I may show unrelenting force on my foes, but those that now find themselves within my realm have no reason to fear undue harm, I need them content and productive and letting Lot run amok will do no good. I grant the local chieftains a small sum so they may organise local militias to maintain order.  Skúli Stjarna continues to be my spymaster and the baron of South Jabal Quzlum. And he continues to be a staunch believer in the Old Gods. His intelligence has been critical to the realm and despite all the baseless accusations thrown at him, I will not have a valuable asset removed because of hearsay and twitchy zealots.  And despite what I tell Count Tosti, Count Amar immediately races up behind him, demanding then if I am not to remove or imprison Skúli then he must be made to convert. I tell my incessant new vassals to leave me, if they have nothing of note to bring up to the court then they can return to their new land which I'm sure is in dire need of control and order considering we only weeks ago took it from the locals. Nurmandyia cannot become a dogmatic stronghold for Islam alone, we thrive on the trade and commerce of visiting Norsemen, if we throw out those still within our borders less we want to stop here on their journies.  We travel south, to visit the new land of our kingdom, this time to survey and observe rather than to lead an army through it. And we make a point to visit Skúli, who despite being hounded by the nearby Counts continues to do good work for Nurmandyia. He has a unique eye on the county, what with his network of spies but it also reveals many minor issues across Jabal Quzlum, that are too numerous and individually too minor to be bothering me with them, and offers to take increased charge of the county so he may rectify these issues personally. Which we agree, likely much to the chargin of the counts.  The counts of which there are simply too many for me to manage. I cannot abide the whims and worries of seven huscarls-turned-counts all trying to make their problems the most salient. Ashraf Shamyid is made Jarl of Naqis and Lot Tokar the Jarl of Bazin. Now all the huscarls can go and pester those two, and in turn I only have to keep two Jarls pleased.  The mayor of Safaga and Central Jabal Quzlum, overseeing the most populated and prosperous cities close to the capital are also kept close on the council.  When we return to Qusayr, we find former-Mufti now Allamah Ehsan Azizid in a heated argument with Bergþór. Ehsan is annoyed about the fact I granted the antiquarian position to the old man (which he himself apparently wanted? He never mentioned it...) and asks why this "conniving merchant" is granted such power in my court while he is a true man of God. I am quick to remind Ehsan that he would not have been invited to Nurmandyia if not for Bergþór, because there would be not Nurmandyia. Second only to my dearest husband, Bergþór is one of the most crucial figures in establishing Nurmans in this region and ensuring we were not all killed by the Egyptians. But, Ehsan has himself contributed much to the realm, he has assuaged the transition from pagan non-believers into proud followers of Allah for most of the warriors and followers who came with me to this land. And for that he should deserve a position in my court as well.  On a lighter note, Marshal Lot presents to me a feline intruder he and a courtier came across in the lower sections of the castle and enquiries if I wish to keep. Of course I wish to keep it! I will name him Muezza, for the prophet's own favoured cat.   A year has passed since the end of the Red Conquest and our ascension to the throne of Nurmandyia, a feast is being held in honour of all the brave Nurmans who have made this possible.  An hour into the festivities, before the attendees become too consumed with mead and wine (this, has been and continues to be the hardest tenant of our new faith to adhere to. A lifetime of excess and relative hedonism is a hard habit to kick) Mayor Njall rises and demands the attention of all present so he may read a poem he has composed, about legacy and desire, it is about me. The mayor is lauded for his kind words and a toast raised to him, then to me, then to Nurmandiya.  This whole feast was arranged by dear Ofeigr. All of this was, Qusayr, Nurmandiya, my town, my kingdom, my people. None of this would have been possible without Ofeigr. He is the greatest man I've known, and I would have never found my own greatness without him.   There is some sense of normalcy beginning to spread across my new realm, once again I am focused on stewardship rather than leading an army. Food has always been an issue in this region, it is dry and dusty with little rainfall, but thanks to a recent trade with have gained a number of cattle, and with aid from some local herders who I convince to settle in Qusayr I allot a large strip of land stretching north from the town to be new pasture for these gentle creatures so we may have meat and milk for years to come.   Gormr is growing up fast, and he is taking a lot after me, which may or may not come back to bite him. Lately he has been infatuated with Illiana, daughter of Skúli, despite her rebuttals of his advances. The boy does not take 'no' lightly and pursues her still, often making trips down to South Jabal Quzlum despite us warning him of bandits and wild animals on the winding mountain trails.  And then one night my steward brings me news that my son had to be rescued from the roads by local garrisons after he slipped along a ravine and a patrolling pair of vigmen heard his mewling. Gormr swears he was not inebriated, and Mayor Zahra does confirm the dire state of the roads in the province. Who knows what may have happened if those soldiers weren't there, who knows how many others may have perished on these roads. Creating safe roads from the capital southward is now a top priority, lest we only ever move goods and people via boat along the coast. Zahra brings a local Egyptian before me, recommended to her by Skúli (I suspect one of his little spies, but he denies it), a Habil Bayoumid who has expertise with building and engineer and with contacts with a number of settlements in the Jabal Quzlum province willing to provide workers to assist. Very well, we let Habil get to work updating and improving the roads in the area.   While regions outside the capital are improved we begin to languish in Qusayr once more, though thankfully it is not a lust for blood that takes me but wanderlust once more. I have seen Rome, Cairo, Mecca and Medina, Constantinople (from a distance), but I have not been to city of prophets, the great Jerusalem. With Ofeigr in tow we depart, (Gormr refuses to accompany us despite my insistence) a brief stop in Cairo to see our good friend Ahmad and then we press on to the Holy Land.  As we approach the holy city, somewhere in the hills of Hebron a band of thugs accosts us. They saw an 'old noble lady' probably overburdened with gold to donate to temples in Jerusalem. The fools did not know who they tangled with, I will give them only steel.  I had thought on the Hajj to Mecca I had witnessed a vibrant diverse city, drawing all the far-flung believers of Islamd together, but here in Jerusalem there are more faiths and cultures present that I even knew of, old and new. I walk among Catholic Franks, Jewish Khazars, Copts and Armenians, fellow Muslims of every sect and branch. There is an odd sense of comradery in this place, but it feels uneasy, and with the Abbasids crumbling I feel many could soon make a play for the grand old city.  Returning to Qusayr, we regretfully discover our dear friend, Mayor Njall has passed, at least a calm death in his sleep. The Jarl of Naqis will take his place as my chancellor on my council.  And now that we're are back home, we find ourselves being visited every other week by Habil to give us updates on the roads in Jabal Quzlum, which have now become a rather extensive project to ensure proper links between the capital and our new central and southern regions of Nsqis and Bazin. Habil is rather frank, and does not address me with the same deference as my other subjects, which I honestly find refreshing, I missed seeing eye-to-eye with my people and not having everyone blindly agreeing with me or bleating like scared lambs whenever I enter a room. Habil's progress so far has been exemplary, but he asks for ever more resources, more men, more funds. If it is for the sake of the realm, and ease of access to and from the capital then it must all be necessary, I put even more trust in the local supervisor and grant him his extra resources.   Gormr has come of age and takes after me in many ways, but, he has no patience, he has big dreams like I once had but no desire to put the work in to achieve them, he is still a decade younger than I am when I took control of Rogaland, there is still time for him to hammer out those blemishes before he is to become King.  But for now, there is only celebrations to focus on, and a wedding!  Two years after starting his grand project to improve our roads, Habil has finally finished. Travelling to the cities and holds of Jabal Quzlum now takes almost half the time as one no longer has to trek hazardous winding mountain paths. Wide secure and supported roadways now crisscross the region and hopefully it'll facilitate trade and let people expand to new areas in the province. Habil Bayoumid has proved himself an invaluable worker and has assuredly earned a place in my court.  After the completion of the roads, many of the skilled workers moved in to the area around Qusayr and with thanks to Zahra I managed to gain use of their services for any future projects near the capital.   I cannot bring back the slain of loved one's that I wrought in my conquest of this land, I can only hope to improve the lives of those that remain.  Every time Jarl Lot visits the court up from Bazin he finds some new way to be aggravated, this time he chose Muezza to be the source of all his woes, and thus *I* was at fault for not keeping a cat under control, however one does that. Let that blasted Jarl bellyache all he wants, it is just a cat. (I may have made a mistake in giving Bazin to Lot, but it is a mistake I cannot correct now without more bloodshed)  Qusayr has grown steadily. We found it a dusty old town, presided over by Emir Hafiz who was content to live in mediocrity beneath the Sultan's protection. We have breathed new life into this community and made it the bustling port of the Red Sea coast, at least - on the African side, I'm sure Arabia has far greater ports than this. For now.  With the new roads in Jabal Quzlum and ease of access, more people are moving to settle there and now there is a need to provide water for drinking and watering crops. Zahra, ever the restless steward proposes we begin an irrigation project across the province at once, to "turn the desert green". There are numerous though small water sources up in the mountains, if we can dig ditches and channels down to the settlements they will have all the water they could need.  I have a granddaughter! Gormr and Alina have had their first child, named Helga - meaning 'holy' or 'blessed', and she truly is.  The irrigation project in Jabal Quzlum has hit some snags as so much of the ground seems unsuitable, both too hard and rocky to dig and at the same time draining away any water that does run over it. But if we are slow and more considerate of the course we try to direct the new ditches we should surely find adequate ground to get water down to the new settlements. With luck we do manage to get water down from the mountains, and now people of Jabal Quzlum are less reliant on isolated wells or trekking up into the mountains to reach the springs.   At least not all my new vassals are like that clod Lot, the new mayor of Central Jabal Quzlum Is'mail has taken quite a liking to Muezza and the cat to him.   If there is one thing I want my rule to be remembered for (beyond the war and adventuring), it is the company I kept. I have travelled all the seas of the North and South and gained and lost followers, warriors and confidants of all colour and creed.  In the decade since my ascension I have already dragged the fame and renown of the new Nurman people up from nothing, and in time the world will see our might and tell tales of Nurmandiya.  I did not achieve greatness alone, and only by maintaining such a vibrant court of varied peoples, ideas, opinions can  Increasingly, as adventurers and merchants arrive on our shores they ask "Is this the realm of Alva the Great?", and even in letters from Sultan Ahmad he has begun to call me The Great. Am I worthy of such a nickname? The likes of Cyrus, Alexander, Charlemange? Well, who am I to argue with them if they wish to call me that. Alva the Great... yeah   House Veisla, 906 (expect next part later today, wanted to split them up as it was more thematically appropriate)
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Feb 26, 2022 10:22
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VII - 906 -909 - One Last Fight Today merchants from the realm of Bardr Yngling, son of Harald, ruler of Maghreb, stopped in Qusayr. Despite conquering the African coast after we had taken the Red Sea and most of the Nord-Africans still following the Old Ways they seem to speak more fluent Arabic than I, in spite of all the learning I have had to do to read the Quran. The Ynglings have decided to adopt the tongue of the local Berbers, another great court of the world's kingdoms that speaks the language of the book at the very least.   My dutiful and loyal spymaster Skúli has passed, and so the position now falls to Is'mail of the nearby town.   Immediately, Lot takes umbrage with the new spymaster. They squabble inanely about this and that, until they manage to get on to the subject of my succession, and about Gormr at which point I am compelled to step in lest the two say something they will quickly regret. Though I agree with Is'mail, I cannot be seen to be siding against Lot all the time, that quarrelsome Jarl can only take so much before he may try something against me, so I will be seen to favour him this time, thankfully I manage to find a compromise between the two.   My administration of Qusayr and the surrounding counties seems to have reached its zenith. Any problems that plagued this land when I first arrived here are long resolved, the people are happy and the goods and gold flow freely.  At this point there is little to do but simply revel in my achievements I suppose.  Any sense of harmony is quickly shattered by sorry events of the next few months however. First, my dear Ofeigr is discovered to be ill. Deathly ill, consumed by cancer. It spreads quickly and in only a matter of weeks he goes from healthy and lively to bedridden and looking gaunt and pale. Bergþór claims to have a number of remedies, some of which may only make things worst. It is not my decision to make though, I let Ofeigr choose.  He does not wish to prolong his suffering or potentially spend his last days in even greater agony, he only wishes to spend what time he has left with him. I dismissed Bergþór and most of the rest of the court save for a few servants to provide food and care to my husband. I stay with him until the end, sitting at the bedside and holding his hand as he slips away.  I emerge from the Castle of Qusayr once more, to go find Bergþór to arrange the funeral, only to discover I'll now be having to make preparations for two, as my most valuable advisor has also passed away.  Two months later, Is'mail dies, and I am in need of a new spymaster once more.  I feel myself being devoured by grief, when the worst possible news arrives in Qusayr. Sultan Ahmad has died. The great Sultan is no more, Egypt is leaderless, the alliance is gone. Nurmandiya is adrift and I have never felt more alone.   I cannot think clearly and every task I try to do around Qusayr is quickly put aside as I struggle to go a day without my mind and soul becoming clouded with the heavy fog of depression. Jarl Ashraf of Naqis has become a close friend over the past few years, he has tried to comfort me in these trying times, and I am considering confiding further in him, just unleashing all my woes on him. But, I cannot just depend on him all the time, it's not fair to him.  Instead, at his recommendation, I turn to the use of a local plant grown in this part of the world, hashish, said to calm the mind and soothe the soul. And that it certainly does, each time I smoke it or consume whatever manner it's almost as if all the troubles of the world just slip away. For a little while, everything is better, but then I find myself needing more of it to keep the darkness away from my mind.  Ashraf then dies.  Fine, Ashraf! just die, that's fine. I'll smoke all the hashish I can find. Put it in all my drinks, all my treats, I just need more of it.  I'm not sure if weeks, or months have passed but I've just been slumped in my throne now, watching the servants go this way and that. Jarl Lot comes in and barks something about Bazin, I couldn't care less. My oaf of a son tries to pretend he runs this court while I have my little 'merry mind journeys'.  Suddenly the little glutton pretends to take offence at someone else enjoying themselves so much, he lashes out at Ehsan one night during a meal. Gormr claims I am letting the 'standard's of my court slip, that all sense of decorum is out the window ever since father died. Decorum? Im a loving viking! I should plaster the walls with the insolent sod's guts. Oh, I need some more hash.  Gormr, my poor boy. Growing up in this place, you're soft. A proper norse boy half your age could kill you with ease. No patience or tact, no desire to strive for something greater than yourself.  Very well, Gormr. If you wish to rule in my stead, then rule.  Egyptian villagers flee into Qusayr, the lands of the Nile have become a warzone. Sultan Ahmad's great stable realm is gone, his sons and cousins and brothers and everyone remotely related to the former Sultan all fight one another for a piece of Egypt.  And yet another of my old friends passes away.  At Least I still have Muezza.  Three months have passed and Gormr has made a shambles of my court. He is a bumbling, contentious, greedy little boy, and I fear the day I finally meet my end, Nurmandiya will find the same fate as Egypt. Even under the influence, I do a better job running this kingdom than he. I find the hashish is helping less and less, or I just need ever more of it.  There's only thing that'll ever bring me happiness isn't there. One thing I am great am, one thing that has brought me all that I am known for and revered. It's time to put down this drat pipe and pick up my sword, one last time. I seek out the strongest claimant to Sultan Ahmad's throne, his oldest living son, Shaybad, and make contact with the faction fighting in his name. They are overjoyed to hear 'the great' Alva Veisla will march at their side, their father's most trusted and adored ally.  Muzaffaraddin, who ever-since forging my crown has been attending to only minor smithing tasks around the castle upon hearing the news jumps at the chance to craft something new and spectacular. If I am to return to the battlefields once more, then he wants to craft a spear for me to wield.  Messengers are sent to Safaga and the now numerous settlements of Jabal Quzlum asking any and all willing warriors to join me in Qusayr. But I do not call upon my vassals - the Jarl of Naqis and Bazin - proper, I do not want them drawn away from their provinces, nor do I really need their assistance.  In no time at all, Muzaffaraddin has completed the spear, a magnificent weapon and it's shaft decorated with symbols, runes and figures of the saga of clan Viesla. It will serve me well I am sure.   Over three thousand Nurman, Egyptian and Beja warriors have congregated in the temporary field camps around Qusayr, a larger army than I have ever commanded. Despite my instructions, I find among them Jarl Lot and his retinue, and he seems just as shocked to see me in the camp as I am with him. "My Queen. With all due respect, you are almost seventy years of age. You cannot surely be about to ride off into battle?" "Like hell I can't." "But, I was expecting to lead this army, am I not your marsha?l" "Then be my marshal and maintain order. Go back to Bazin, Lot. I have a war to win."  We march back across the Eastern Desert until we set eyes on the Nile once more. This land has become a patchwork of feuding fiefdoms, towns and villages fighting one another and local lords scrapping for control of whatever they can. I have not come here to conquer though, and I do not let my troops run amok in the towns of my former friend and ally. We capture what we can, try to restore order until we link up with the other Shaybad Loyalists.  With all the armies mustered we move northward up the Nile on either side, capturing towns and convincing the locals that we are supporting the true successor to Ahmad, that joining forces with us will ensure their safety, and a return to a prosperous Egypt.  By the end of summer we have reached the capital region. While the Shaybad Loyalists drive off Sultan Mina's force we make a mad dash for Cairo. The city we had sworn we would take all those years ago. The paltry garrison left by Mina in Cairo put up little fight, morale amongst the false-Sultan's army quickly draining. The gates of Cairo are thrown open by locals and we are greeted practically as liberators.  I march through the streets of Cairo, a city I have frequented many times now. But never as a commander, never with three thousand brave loyal soldiers at my side. I could take it. I could proclaim myself Queen of Egypt.  In the deserted Sultan's palace I enter the throne room with a handful of my huscarls. I lay my spear down at the base of the vacant throne, brushing my hand across the arm-rest, almost afraid to touch the chair. "Oh Ahmad. You swore I'd never take this throne while you still drew breathe. And now you're gone and here I stand." I shake my head and smirk, picking my spear back up and motioning to my huscarls. The Shaybad Loyalists are expecting us across the river. "Rest well in paradise, old friend, I will join you soon"  We cross The Nile and rejoin with the other rebels and at the base of the Pyramids we capture the forts still loyal to Mina. These monuments, tombs of the pharaohs, still astound us. What great feats must they have done to have earned such immense tombs, and who are we to walk in their shadows while they slumber. I can ponder such things when I return home and have some hashish, for now I must focus on the battles to come.  The south and core of Egypt is under our control, only the coast remains. Mina's forces have combined at the delta and are capturing any towns proclaiming their loyalty to Shayban and coercing the inhabitants to take up arms for Mina.  While Shaybad's Loyalists move to engage with Mina's army we are ordered to do what we do best - ever since the day we took up arms and stood at our father's side - raid, overrun superior defences and forces and capture settlements. We march on Alexandria, lost stronghold of Mina.  By the time the Battle of Rashid has concluded and our allies are marching to join us, we have breached the walls of Alexandria and have control of the city. Mina, the boy Sultan, is captured. He is but a child, twelve years of age. He barely knows what any of this is about and has almost certainly been propped up by one of his uncles so they may control him from behind the scenes, but that's an issue Shaybad will have to deal with on his own.  While in the smaller palace of Alexandria we come across an translation into Arabic of a far older tome, detailing in great lengths about the architecture and engineering techniques of the Egyptians who ruled this land before the Caliphates came.  There is much knowledge to be gleaned from this book, and we finally have something notable to display in our court when we return. Perhaps we will have pyramids, sphinxes and obelisks dedicated to the Veisla family one day.  During all the chaos in Egypt, norsemen have been raiding the northern shores (we ensure the Red Sea remains safe). A band of vikings in their longships approached Alexandria, thinking they could seize the goods from merchant boats in the docks, only to find Nurman huscarls and vigmen awaiting on the jetties and piers. They did not know 'Alva the Great' had staked a claim to this city and they quickly retreat once more. But not before the raiding party leader informs us, that there have been many changes back up since our departure from Rogaland. Frankish and Saxon encroachment and the ever furthering realms of adventurers falling further out of the influence of the homeland has forced King Andrés of Sweden's hand. He has reformed the Old Ways, codified and formalized our old faith into a proper church to emulate the likes of Christendom or Islam.  In Alexandria the rest of Shaybad's Loyalists unite with us and celebrations are held in honour of our victory and the restoration of order to Egypt. We feast for a week and swap tales of valour and great past deeds with Egyptian commanders and faris. But, home calls once more. I know I could have taken Egypt, I could have been Queen of all this. And that thought alone will comfort me to my final days.  Coming home to Qusayr we are in higher spirits than we have felt in many years and return to our court reinvigorated and ready to face whatever problems our realm can throw at us.  It has been too long since we have held court, and invite all my subjects, vassals and councillors to come forth with whatever it is that ails them.  The first man who comes forth is a commoner, a Beja man far from the southern fringes of the kingdom. A representative of an on-going revolt that has been occuring in Bazin beneath Jarl Lot's watch. They refuse to pay taxes to the corrupt Jarl and claim previous obligations beneath the Kings of Nubia and Aksum exempted them from having to pay tax.  I remind them they are not serving the Kings of Queens of Nubia or Aksum anymore. They lay within Nurman lands and should they wish to continue receiving the protection and aid of the throne they will pay their due taxes. I shoot a look of annoyance to Lot who simply pushes the commoner aside, seemingly claiming the next spot in the line.  Lot claims my faris Agathos has been looting and pillaging our own villages in Bazin and that this is why the locals refuse to pay taxes. I have no doubt there is something nefarious at foot, and that Lot likely allowed Agathos free reign to ransack Beja towns and is now trying to cover for himself. But for the sake of saving face I order Agathos to return all that he has stolen from the Beja people, he is obviously displeased and looks as though he has his own complaints but I ensure he holds his tongue.  And then, just as Jarl Lot pushed aside the common Beja man, another rushed forward and pushed Jarl Lot aside. One of my own soldiers who I had not noticed at the back of the room, he is dishevelled and drunk, his axe clutched in his hand and adorned in full armour. "Monster! You sent us to die! Why do you go unpunished?" My Jarls and faris present in the throne room all rush to apprehend the man but I hold out a hand to stop them as I slowly rise from my throne and look to the maniac. "Who are you to come before me like this?" "My father died in Dithmarschen when I was but a welp, my brother slain on the banks of the Nile. Do you even know their names? DO you know mine? How many have you led to their deaths, you vile snake. All for your glory, all for that blood soaked throne! Fight me Alva! For all those that you led to their deaths, I come here to avenge them! Fight you coward or let their withered hands rise from the underwater to drag you down there where you belong!" Again my soldiers all have their swords drawn, and bows ready to let loose on this man and cut him to ribbons. I glance around to those present, the cowering courtiers and a concerned Jarl Lot and Gormr looking on, both with their swords drawn.   I don't utter another word, the throne room is still apart from the heavy ragged breathing of the intruder. I reach for my spear, hanging on a plaque above the throne and I flourish it into my hands and take up a fighting stance before the soldier.  We circle one another for a few moments, I see the many dents and scratched that adorn the man's armour, he has survived many battles. I have the longer reach with my spear, but inside this cramped crowded throne room my movement is limited.  I make the first move, feigning an attack with the spear only to withdraw a knife from my belt at the lost moment and swipe for the man as he dodges.  With a swing of his axe he almost hits my outstretched arm and I drop the knife and regain control of my spear with both hands, thrusting and swinging it widely but the man remains so close that he dodges with ease, even just grabbing the weapon and redirecting its course as he edges nearer and swings his axe ever closer.  I take a step back, ready to charge full speed at the intruder with spear held tight to my body, even if he catches it, the force and speed will send him off his feet and I can finish him off. I charge but at the last second he manages to dodge, I feel an intense seething pain as I see a flash of steel past my face and an explosion of red burst forth from beneath my chin.  My hands release my spear and instinctively go to clutch at what remains of my neck but I am already on my back, staring up at the intruder, there is no sound in my ears but a deafening ringing. He raises his axe over his head triumphantly, coated in my blood, as she screams something unheard in victory before driving it across his own throat in one final act of defiance. A dozen arrows impact him and a spear appears from somewhere and pierces his chest, but he is already gone.  I see Gormr clutching me, crying, I cannot move or speak, just bare seconds of life left within my old body. I will close my eyes one last time and when they open again I will be looking upon Jannah or Valhalla. It matters not, I care not what awaits me in the next world, I've already become legend in this one.   House Veisla, 909 Crisis Now fucked around with this message at 19:04 on Feb 26, 2022 |
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Feb 26, 2022 18:25
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Veryslightlymad posted:I don't think we've seen his spouse's adult stats yet, which could have a huge influence on his court. 
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Feb 26, 2022 21:41
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Veryslightlymad posted:Honestly, not that bad. Sure, she's a deceitful, lazy coward, but she likes us, and either boosts our best stat or shores up a crucial weakness. We never married for the stats. The alliance she brought bore the kingdom 
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Feb 26, 2022 22:09
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VII - 909 -914 - The King and the Prince There is commotion all around, shouting, people running in every direction. The body of Jawdat, the murder, is being hauled away, but I am still craddling what was my mother, my hand clutching hers though it has grown cold. I feel another hand grab at my arm and yank me up, away from her, away from the life I had lived just moments ago. It is Jarl Lot, holding my wrist he thrusts my clenched hand still wet with Alva's blood up into the air. "The Queen is dead! Long live the King!" He barks. From around the packed throne room there is a disgustingly-triumphant chorus of "Long Live the King! Long live King Gormr!" I am now ruler of the Nurmans.  One week has passed. I sit on her throne, my wife now sitting where my father once did. The reality of the situation is still taking some time to sink in. I am the same age as my mother when she began this grand saga, but at the start of it all she had but a single tiny frost-bitten town to her name. I have the care and wellbeing of a hundred thousand people and thousand miles of Red Sea coastline to contend with.  I think, in the end, my mother probably found the death she had been seeking. Her final years were restless and the quiet live of a duteous monarch sitting on their throne never seemed to suit her. She may have been a true and devoted convertee to the one true God, but the viking in her never died. It always yearned for battle, for gold and power seized from other's hands, and I don't think she would have accepted anything less than a glorious death in combat. And I know she's either feasting in Valhalla or causing all kinds of ruckus in Jannah right now. With her death, the last of the Veisla clan that departed from our fabled homeland far in the north is gone. We are a clan no longer, we are a noble house, a feudal lord, and clinging to this odd name and image will serve us no good any longer. We are king of Nurmandiya, and it is only right we take the name of this land and our people.  I doubt I will ever be a great warrior like 'Alva the Great', she was never happy that I didn't quite match up to her expectations or own skills when she was my age, but I didn't live the life she has, this desert brings its own harshness I do not know what growing up in Rogaland was like, I have never even seen snow or ice before. But in these next few years while I cement my rule over my new kingdom, trying to remember everything my mother taught me may be key - a strong hand to unite my people, but not so strong to shatter their trust and compliance.  Mother's absence from the court, both physical during her last adventure in Egypt and uh, spirtual, during her increasing reliance on that dreaded hashish took it's toll on our court, I have a little work ahead of me to recover its reputation and attract courtiers and guests to come and stay here and help the realm  Speaking of courtiers I have inherited my mother's council, which remains unchanged. Surprisingly Jarl Lot, who mother would constantly rail against has been one of the most supportive of me in this transitional weeks, perhaps he thinks if he can curry favour with the new king as soon as possible he'll gain greater power in the south, agh, I am already beginning to think like her.  With Bergþór gone, both the court physician and antiquarian positions now sit vacant, a local scholar / healer is found with more than adequate medical knowledge to assist the court, and Muzaffaraddin has already proved himself a capable metalsmith and craftsman after forging the very crown that now sits atop my head and the spear that hangs on the wall behind me, he will take charge of caring for all the artefacts we acquire and procuring new ones.   Beyond mother's friendship with Sultan Ahmad (which was born out of proxmity, and the fact the Sultan let her live), she seemed to make little attempt to connect with the wider Muslim World we have found ourselves thrust into the middle of. Great empires (or the crumbling remains) and houses exist all around us, and thanks to the Red Conquest and ascension of Nurmandiya we have gained some renown.   I have requested marriages with the daughters of the Caliphs of Cordoba and the Abbasid Empire, though their actual political power is waning they still hold great spiritual sway, and with any luck it'll buy me some more legitimacy.   A month has passed, my mother may be gone but the problems in the kingdom she forged still remain, and so I must hold my first official court.  Alfgeir stands at the forefront of the petitioners, a commander of Jarl Lot, and he holds in his arms a bundled up baby. "My king, this boy - Yugerten - is without a father, despite his noble lineage. His father was the Wali of Constantine on the north African coast. He was kidnapped by vikings who had raided Constantine when he was but a few weeks old and they brought him along hoping to gain an ever higher ransom price, the longer he was withheld from his family." He sighs and rocks the babe in his arms as the noise of the court begins to stir him "But, when they learned that Constantine was captured in a war, that the Kutamid dynasty had all but been wiped out, they simply dumped this poor boy on our laps, and they continued on their pillaging spree further down the coast. I beseech you to please find some solution so this poor orphan may have some glimmer of hope for his years to come."   "I will raise this boy, take him in to my household and treat him as if he were my own son. He may have lost his family but he will find a new one here in this court, that I can ensure." I can see my wife, the queen smiling and nodding approvingly out the corner of my eye, and the commander steps forth with the child and presents it to us.  The commander's direct liege, Jarl Lot in fact, stood right behind him, ready to come forth next, ever the man with a thousand problems. "King Gormr, you may be insulated from the heathenry that infests this lands but let me ensure you, in the Jarldom of Bazin we are beset by heretics, heathens and all manner of raving pagan lunatics, followers of faiths so ancient and debased I could not begin to describe, not to mention the Adamites who have only gained a foothold on our borders since Queen Alva and Sultan Ahmad drove them from Bazin. So far all my efforts to force them to see the light of Allah have fallen on deaf ears, we must exert more pressure on these unbelievers, grant me the funds and power and I will see to it that the southern lands of Nurmandiya follow the true faith!"  Strong words from a Rogaland-born once-pagan boy before finding Allah on the shores of Qusayr when Ahmad came marching. Allamah Ehsan is quick to step forward, giving only a momentary curtsey before feeling compelled to interject the impassioned Jarl. "My King, if I may, perhaps now is the time to be extending not the sword towards these non-believers, but the olive branch. They have seen all too well that we can be a people of great violence and brutality, your dearly departed mother made sure of that in the Red Conquest. Any more violence towards them only sees violence returned on our part, now is the time to show them that we can also be a people of kindness and humility. We must help them, so they can help us. If we kill them, they will only try to kill us. It is simple."  I contemplate Ehsan's words for a moment then nod "Your council is much appreciated Ehsan, and your words surely hold some truth. Force has not turned these people to our ways, so perhaps now we show them our kindness instead. You will travel back to Bazin with Jarl Lot and oversee local alms for the poor and downtrodden of Bazin and Badi."  Finally, mayor Haroun of Central Jabal Quzlum approaches, raving about a local preacher that I have also seen around Qusayr, a preacher who is a woman... "It would be fine if she led a congregation of her sisters or daughters, but she stands on the market square of Qusayr and preaches to men and women alike! It is causing a stir in all the county and in my own, where the people of Central Jabal Quzlum ask why there cannot be the same authority given, 'look at what they allow in Qusayr' they all say 'If it can stand in the capital, it should be allowed here'. Put an end to this madness and let us return to the way things should be, according to scripture" Of all people, Jarl Lot steps back in from the sidelines of the court to rebuke the mayor. "Haroun, surely given our leige's predecessor you can understand we should not be so willing to adhere to such strict guidelines, when a woman can bring us greatness just as much as a man. If she can bring the light of the Lord to the common people then it is only a boon for us all."  I nod in agreement with the Jarl who only smirks looking back to the mayor before I speak. "And was it not a woman, Umm Waraqa, who had memorised the words of the Prophet before quill had been put to parchment, and without whom so many would have not been brought to the Lord. I see no reason why this woman cannot preach and lead prayer." The mayor huffs and scrowls but Lot only nods in approval and bows before stepping back into the crowd.  As the throne room clears out, the peasants and lords alike depart to return to their lands one figure is left standing at the back of the room who had been silently observing the proceedings this whole time. One of my guards by the door is thumbing the hilt of his sword in its scabbard as he looks at the man and glances at me but I shake my head and raise a hand to him. "Come forward stranger, why do you linger so at the back of my throne room?" The man stops leaning against the back wall of the throne room with his arms crossed and strides confidently into the center of the room, looking around at the decor, the guards and finally at me. He has the dark complexion of the people of the south of my realm, a Beja or Nubian, but this is no peasant, not by the way he is dressed nor the way he holds himself. "So this is the home of Ratu Layung." He gives a very dramatic curtsey and continues his graceful walk toward me and the Queen. "I expected more. A grand citadel from which she must have commanded her great legion of barbarian Nurmans with which she bore such terror during the Nalukkeun Beureum. "And what are you then, a messenger from Dongola here to make some half-hearted plea to the people of Nurmandiya?" He only chuckles at my quite obvious attempt at bravado and simply shakes his head. "Your highness, I am Theodosios. Prince Theodosios Azim, heir to the kingdom of Nubia."   "Or at least, I was. I forgo my birthright, I have no desire to lead, nor to command any army or preside over any court. I am a man of God. My faith is my shield, and my tongue is my sword." He winks to Queen Alia and she emits a gigglish sound the likes I've never heard from her with a hand over her mouth, I feel a rage building in me which is only stopped when the prince suddenly takes my hand and plants a kiss atop it and winks to me too.  "A-and what pray tell, brings you to my court, Prince Theodosios" I ask, stumbling over my own words now "I have travelled the lengths of the Nile, seen Cairo, Aksum, Lalibela and now Qusayr. Danced the desert nights away on the sands of Darfur around campfires of Kushite tribes, supped from the waters of the Siwa Oasis, climbed to the summit of Ras Dashen and shouted to the heavens with the Solomonid King. But there lies so much more beyond these shores. So much more that can be seen and enjoyed, and brought back. Is it not in your own family's motto? To feast on foreign shores? Well, with your permission, and just a little donation, I wish to venture to lands afar in your name, and bring back the treasures I find and tales I forge!  I have never left Nurmandiya, never even gone beyond the forty miles or so to Jabal Quzlum. But mother's tales of the lands she saw in her Viking days still fill my head with such fanciful imagery. Theodosios spends the week at our court while we plan a route for him to take, for people to meet, ruins to delve in and monuments to visit. All the while he enthrals all those he comes across in Qusayr with his exuberant personality and incredible tales and poems. He plans to sail back up the Nile and then travel back down the coast of the Red Sea on the Arabian side, following the shore all the way to Muscat and back north to Baghdad, then Damascus, Jerusalem and finally down through Negev to catch a boat back to Qusayr.   With the population of Qusayr and Jabal Quzlum (I am considering changing the names of these provinces and towns, they are simply not -Nurman- enough) growing with our ever increasing prestige there are more mouths to feed, we cannot rely on trade with Egypt alone forever and must make greater efforts to green our desert.  My second wife, Niki Abbasid has given me a son and my new heir, a baby boy we will name Anthinos - which means 'to flourish'.  We have been spending many months overseeing the laying out and construction of the new plantations along the Qusayr coastline and helping the locals where we can. One night as we head back toward the town from a new outlying settlement I and my guards spot a number of figures, hooded and draped in cloaks, hauling sacks full of food and weapons into the night desert. Deserting.  I order my guards to apprehend them at once and we charge at the traitors, a brawl breaks out. In all the confusion and fighting, and all the shouting and cursing, I can make out they are dissatisfied by this long peace and that I would "make farmers out of proud warriors". If I will not take the kingdom on a new war, then they will simply go to a new kingdom do find the wars they long for. Suffice to say we could not stop them running away.  Mayor Suhaila, my steward excitedly approached me today in the castle, holding a loft a fragrant smelling letter from Theodosios. "My liege, contact from the Prince!" She exclaims with excitement, clutching the letter tightly "Shall I read it to you?" "For ten days and ten nights me and my party have been hiding. The bandit lady Vartanoush has set a blockade on the road we must travel - what do you advise? Caution? Or should we fight them, trusting God to keep us safe? SIgned, Theodosios." "It seems he is in quite the predicament, your highness. The letter came to us from a traveller who said they are south of the Holy Land, preparing to trek south along the Arabian coast. How should I tell them to proceed?"  Vartanoush is one of hundreds of bandits and warlords that have arisen in the Levant and Mesopotamia following the sudden collapse of the Abbasid Empire. The 'warmongering giant' of Arabia was all set to restore order but he went and died and now his less impressive son leads the Nasrid realm.  "Tell him to lay low, there is no need to draw undue attention so far from home where help can never reach him"  "My most treasured King Gormr. I will spare you all the grizzly details, but I can ensure you there was plenty of 'laying low' to be had, and I even managed to convince the Armenian bandit queen to part ways with some of her gold, which I trust my messenger has not all spent by the time this letter reaches you"  Since the arrival of little Anthinos on the scene, and with it the realisation that she will not become Queen, poor Helga has not taken the news too well. It seems she takes after Alva far more than I, and she has only become more rebellious and arrogant as she approaches her teens. She regularly picks fights with my own guards and will take any opportunity to sneak into the castle's armoury to relieve it of weaponry so she can train for the day she believes she will take to the battlefield to lead Nurmans to glorious victory like 'Granny Alva' Jarl Lot is holding one of his little tournaments that he insists on every time he visits Qusayr up from the south, but this time Helga simply insists that she be allowed to take part.  Completely unsurprisingly she proves little match for viking warriors and Beja nomadic desert horsemen three times her height and size, thankfully she tires herself out fairly quickly and retires to the sidelines before she can bring herself to any harm.  "My liege!" exclaims Mayor Suhaila, yet again holding a sealed letter in her hands. "The Prince writes once more!" I motion my steward over at once and ask her to read it to me and she opens it at once and begins to scan the words and smiles with bright eyes "Such a way with words" She utters before reading. "I am not in the desert, I am in the land of dreams. The difference between awakening and sleep is gone. My guide tells me I hallucinate what I desire the most. A paradise, a pool of water glistening like diamonds, laced with treasures at it's banks." Suhaila trails off as her eyes continue to scan down the parchment and her cheeks begin to blush profusely, glancing between me and the letter before I motion for her to continue. "Instead, my lord, all I see is you here with me. Forever one sandbank ahead. Beckoning me to keep going. And it breaks me to know each step I take towards that mirage, I step further away from the true you." I stare back at the steward wided eyed as she glances about the throne room, a lone guard standing at the door pretending not to hear a thing, I look to the thankfully vacant smaller throne beside my own where Queen Alia would normally sit. "Well, u-uh, write back that I may consider his attention, if he were to bring me a grand prize" I pull a face and shrug at Suhaila "Eh, Nubians, what are they like, huh?"  After inspecting new irrigation and agricultural projects in Jabal Quzlum we stopped by an inn on our journey back to the capital. It is packed with people, maybe because they knew the King was visiting, and my guards insist they clear it out before I enter, but I am not afraid to associate with the common folk. There is a large group of well armoured soldiers outside with matching insignia, and even more inside, they are loud and rambunctious, getting into fights with one another and any one in the inn that looks at them for more than a few seconds. The inn keeper tries to plead with me to deal with them. "Aah, the King." The commander bows, almost falling over in the process in his drunken stupor. "Is there a reason you're making a mockery of this honest man's establishment, commander Valþjofr?" "Aye that there is, your highness! We grow weary of patrolling these same roads, of watching over the same patch of dirt day in day out. My boys demand a fight. And if we cant get one, we'll just make one'' There is a cacophony of jeers from the mercenaries that is only silenced when I slam my fist on the table. "Clear out of here and leave these poor people to their drinks, lest I have my men throw you and ensure you won't be coming back" The mercenary captain stands upright, sobering remarkably quickly and sizes me up, narrowing his eyes and looking back to his soldiers. "Come on boys, your King, has spoken" Perhaps Nurmandiya has gone too long without a war. I cannot force a race of ruthless warmongers into quiet pastoralism in such short a time.  My third wife, Tarifa Umayyad has granted me two little gifts in the form of another daughter and son, twins! Named Cena and Karl.  A new communique from Theodosios, but this time it is not a letter, but a person. "Good day, your highness, my name is Andronikos, I have been in employ of Prince Theodosios for some weeks, and I bring news from Phrygia." "Where?"  "Well you see, we got a little turned around and followed the wrong coast, but fear not! The Prince can ensure you even greater treasure is to be found in the lands of the Greeks rather than the Arabs. He, just needs a little more money is all!" It's a good thing I kept the gold Theodosios relinquished from the Armenian bandit queen, I can just send it right back to him to continue whatever wild mess he has gotten himself into.  Akin Shirazid is a chief's son from a southern tribe beyond Bab-el-Mandeb - the strait between Africa and Arabia. He sought refuge in Egypt while his land was in turmoil, and made the mistake of siding with the boy Sultan Mina. My mother captured him in the siege of Cairo and he has been our prisoner-turned-guest ever since. He has been here many years now and laments the sorry state of his homeland and wishes for an end to the turmoil. 'If only some king or queen would send their army down there and put me in charge'. Yes, I get the message, and I may finally have a war to sate the lust for battle that many of the Nurman warriors still harbour.   More letters and envoys from Theodosnios. He is now deep in Anatolia, being hosted by Greek, Azysian and Pontic dukes and despots and tasting of pleasures we can only imagine from the evocate words he weaves in his letters. He has also sent gifts, and recipes for how better to use our food here in Qusayr which we make use of at once!   We continue to prepare for our expedition to the south to install Akin as new ruler of Adal and to restore order to his homeland, we have been spending more time drilling with the men and conducting wargames and strategy theorising with the marshal Jarl Lot. During one training exercise one low soldier becomes a little too eager in a friendly bout with me, and I am forced to disarm him lest he do me serious harm. The young footman, Akbar Sterki, shows great skill however and he will find a position suitable of his skills. We can also find a use for those lay-about mercenaries that infest Jabal Quzlum and give them the war they crave.   In December 912 we are ready to depart. Two thousand warriors and seven mercenaries gather on the longships in Qusayr and we set sail for the south, with myself at the helm of the lead ship.  We approach the shore again, having passed through the strait. The area is thick with ships, viking raiding parties, Arab warships trying to maintain order and engaging everything that looks like trouble, and daring merchant vessels lined with a hundred archers to deter pirates zipping through it all. Thankfully twenty longships filled to the brim with Nurman warriors eager for war is enough of a deterrent to keep any ships away from us as we make landfall once more.  All along the coast of Zalia are columns of black smoke, a perpetual battleground and ransacked settlements. A viking band belonging to some Perso-Norse lord quickly scatter as the Nurman Band beneath Captain Valþjofr slam their way onto the beach and charge screaming and hollering into the fray against raiders of local tribes seeking to exploit the chaos. Within the hour we land behind them, and I step foot for the first time, on foreign shore.  Adal is currently held by Mubarak ibn Bahir Shirazid, who has done a dreadful job of maintaining his realm or any form of relations with the surrounding tribes. With one exception - he has managed to gain the support of Sultan Hussayn Nasrid of Arabia, who seemingly hopes to prop the failed Emir up so he can use Adal as a springboard into his own holy-war expeditions into the Horn of Africa, similar to mother's Red Conquest.    Zalia falls in time at all, though there is frankly little to actually capture, and we leave a garrison behind on the coast to protect the longships and try to bring some semblance of peace to the coastal settlements, while I lead the army further inland. Where the Nasrids are butting heads with all the invading forces in Adal, and in time, ours.   By late Spring we have captured Dakkar, capital of Adal and made the fortress here our temporary home. There is some form of centralised government here in Dakkar and larger permanent stonework structures compared to the rudimentary huts we have encountered on our march from the sea. We at least can be afford some comfort and shelter from the blistering heat. But it does not take long for Sultan Hussayn to have squashed all other opposition in the region until there is only one last army to fight. Word reaches us they will be upon Dakkar by the end of week, so we sally forth to find a good position to meet them - our own siege of the fortress has left it in no defensible state.  In a hilly area west of Dakkar we engage the Sultan's army and I have my first true taste of combat. They outnumber us, but the mercenaries of the Nurman Band are relentless, and my own faris are veterans of the Red Conquest and age has not slowed them one bit.  In the middle of the bloody melee the faris of Nurmandiya and Arabia clash, experts and veterans of many wars pitted against their equal. Jarl Lot is heavily wounded by an Arabian Sheikh and looks as though he may be cut down for good, before Agathos saves him at the last time.   Agathos, pays dearly though, and loses his life in the fray.  Despite the numerical advantage the Arabians had, we retained the high-ground and our seasoned commanders were able to shift the battle in our favour against those of the Sultan, who thus far had only been fighting the less-disciplined local tribes. Sultan Hussayn is sent fleeing back to the west to friendly territory, while Emir Mubarak becomes split up (potentially intentionally abandoned by the Sultan), and we move in to apprehend him.   Thanks to Sultan Hussayn putting down all the other invaders we have no one left to contest our hold on the region, and with Mubarak in our custody we can dictate whatever terms we please - like forcing him to abdicate and putting his brother Akin on the throne. Akin Shirazid in return swears fealty to Nurmandiya, to serve me in whatever future wars that may await the Nurman people.   With my first victory assured, having defeated the Sultan of Arabia in battle, and a new colony (/client state?) established further down the Red Sea coast, we relocate back to Zalia, re-embark on the longships and make the journey home.  We arrive back in Qusayr in the new year of 914, to find no letters or envoys from Theodosios, but the man himself, he has returned from his four-year long adventure across both the Levantine coast and through Asia Minor.  He has with him a cart of goods and treasures and trinkets that would put most viking raid's hoard to shame. His little band of adventurers and servants already unloading it all as locals converse with them and ask of what they saw and who they met on their journey. Prince Theodosios however has a special gift specially for me. He holds aloft a fabric covered item and bows his head. "For the King of the Nurmans," I pull away the fabric to see a dagger unlike any I have ever laid eyes on before "I present the most exquisite weapon, crafted by the greatest blacksmith in all of Bzyantium and blessed by the Ecumnical Patriarch himself in the Hagia Sophia. Do not be deceived by its size, it's honed edge can penetrate even the sturdiest of plate or chain. But this not a weapon of war, it is one for you to keep on your person always, to protect you in your most dire hour against those who would see harm brought to one of such grace and dignity." It is truly one of the most magnificent weapons I have laid eyes on, and I cannot possibly thank Theodosios enough.  Prince Theodosios is made a permanent member of my court, with hope that there will be many more adventures yet to come.  
Crisis Now fucked around with this message at 01:32 on Mar 1, 2022 |
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Mar 1, 2022 00:52
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Rody One Half posted:Actually thinking on it we hybridized with Egyptian so do we already have access to Unite Africa? I'm not 100% on how hybridizing interacts with cultural decisions. 
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Mar 2, 2022 19:27
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