[CHAR] The Imperial Crisis: Succession

[The Survivor]

Name:Countess Elizabeth Marie Mallory (Formerly Major Elizabeth Mallory of the Imperial Medical Corps.)

Caste: Nobility

Occupation: Overseer of Hilside Mine in her county, the biggest mine in the region. Also is consulted with the concerns and wishes of the people of her county.

Appearance and Personality: Elizabeth is 5'7, with a slender, pointed face and few wrinkles, despite her age. The only visible wrinkles that can be seen are around her mouth, most likely from years of smiling. She has auburn, slightly graying hair, and green eyes. She has a lithe frame.

Elizabeth is a cheerful woman at the best of times and a determined one at the worst. In her youth her only burning passion was service to her country. But then she fell in love. Her focus gradually shifted from the empire to her family and county. While she could've striven to be the head of the IMC, but family was more important to her. She cares about the people under her rule and could certainly usher in an era of prosperity if she became Empress, but she lacks ambition.

Biography:
Elizabeth Marie Mallory was born a viscountess in the year 94 in Hilside County, which is right in the middle of the empire. Growing up she was fascinated with medicine and with the military. Two subjects at the opposite ends of the spectrum. When she turned 17, she attended the Imperial Military Academy. She was deployed when was 21. She played a big part as far as healing goes in the Second Livonian-Rozrrian war. She was deployed to a medical camp in the midst of combat and within 3 months turned it into one of the most effective medical centers in the Corps. For years, she served effectively and loyally but she fell in love with a foot soldier. They got married and had 2 kids, but he was killed in a training accident. Now she was 28 and alone with 2 toddlers. She stayed with the military for about 10 more years before she retired. It has been 4 years since she retired and she's taking care of her family and county, but certain friends think she deserves to be Empress and will lead this empire into it's longest golden age.

Motivation: Her main motivations is to protect her family and county, but those may very well change with recent developments.

Other Notes: Will edit the biography as we go along.

[Vahir]

Friedrich len Ruthweiler, the Black Prince

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Age: 39

Caste: Royalty (Second son of His Majesty the Emperor)

Occupation: Prime Minister of the Holy Rozarrian Empire, second only to his father, the Emperor. Titled as the Archduke of Ruthweiler, and Margrave of Nezannia. He also has considerable influence in the largest companies in the Empire, mainly due to being the primary investor for them, and is said to be the most wealthy man in the nation not currently sitting on a throne.

Description: Prince Friedrich is known to be appealing in both appearance and personality, reputed to be handsome, charming, friendly, and sociable. He has quite a talent for convincing others to see things his way, and at giving people an impression that his ideas were theirs. Nor is he superficial; he may be the shrewdest statesman of this generation, and it is through his sheer competence that the Empire continues to run smoothly.

But those who know him personally often attest him to be frighteningly chilly. Beneath his gentlemanly demeanor, he cold, calculating, and ruthless to a fault. His tenure as Prime Minister has seen some of the worst horrors in the history of the Empire, with his main policy being the advancement of the nation's goals, regardless of cost or sacrifice. Deep down, there is not a shred of empathy in him.

Biography: Friedrich Odmar len Ruthweiler was born in the year 97 (after the coronation of the first Emperor) in the ancestral family castle of Ruthweiler. His father was the future emperor, Norman len Ruthweiler. As third in line for the throne, he was afforded a very demanding education, one that he thrived in. His tutors commended his quickness of mind and his cleverness, while his older brother, the Crown Prince, did no better than mediocre in his own education.

When his father succeeded to the throne, Friedrich was 19 years old, and serving in the officer corps of the Imperial Army, as was custom for royals. He participated in the second Livonian-Rozarrian War, and was attached to the army which marched into the Livonian metropolis of Cozen, a mere two weeks after the begining of the war. Within another week, the war was over, the Empire had annexed a full third of the old Livonian Federation, and Prince Friedrich found himself covered in commendations. For his contribution to the war, he was awarded the Margravate of Nezannia, formed from one of the Livonian nations conquered in the war.

Though the Nezannians were rebellious and practically rioting against their annexation, within five years he had pacified it into one of the stablest Inferior provinces of the Empire. The Emperor, always with an eye for talent and needing a competent right hand to deal with the machinations of the nobility in Parliament, appointed the Black Prince Prime Minister of the Empire. He quickly brought the regime efficiency it had not known it decades.

One of the earliest crisis he had to deal with was the clamoring of an agressive noble faction, headed by the Crown Prince, that the Empire invade Xiang. A large part of the Imperial Army was of like mind, and even the Emperor was inclined to agree with the proposal. Friedrich gave his silent approval, more convinced by the need to distract the nobility with something than any real inclination to take over the Heavenly Kingdom. When the resulting war turned into the thirteen year bungle that has continued to this day, the Black Prince blamed the incompetence of the Crown prince for the debacle, much to the latter's humiliation. This began a longstanding feud between the two.

Today, Prince Friedrich still serves the Empire as the most competent Prime Minister in living memory. Currently, he is in Xiang, directing a campaign against the still=resisting republic there.

Motivation: Prince Friedrich is remarkably indifferent about almost everything. His one purpose is the advancement of the Empire: if he could accomplish this by helping the people out of poverty, he would do so. If he could accomplish it by massacring every last citizen, he would also do so, without so much as hesitation. In pursuit of the glory of the Empire, there is nothing he will not do.

[Zugzwang]

Name: Major General Alexander len Myrtenblume, Count of Velburg

Age: 30

Caste: Lesser Nobility

Occupation: Chief of Staff, Army of the Northern Electors

Appearance and Personality: Alexander’s picture could very well be found in the dictionary, next to the word ‘Soldier’. He is tall, broad-shouldered and well-muscled. His skin is tan from years in the field, and he looks perfectly at home in grey uniform and gold braid. His posture is pike-straight, his strides purposeful, and his voice loud and confident. His black hair is kept neat, a dusting of stubble always visible on his chin. He bears the scars of a professional soldier, but they lend him an air of worldliness and bravery rather than danger. His brown eyes are always set on the horizon, and he always gives whoever addresses him his full attention, and is never disrespectful. He is rarely seen without his sword, and more rarely seen out of uniform. Though the gruff and adventurous man has dropped out of fashion somewhat, he finds himself blessed with the attention of fashionable ladies, though has never been seen letting them interfere with his duties.

Alexander is, at his core, a man who understands the workings of power. Every action of his is a move in the game of its accumulation and exchange. He acts and looks the perfect soldier, kind, fair and ruthless, and is loved by his subordinate officers for it. He understands rhetoric and its uses, and applies the tactics of the podium in his everyday life. Alexander values friendships for their practical applications, hates those who prohibit him from continuing his advancement, and deals with both friend and ally with decisiveness. Years ago he learned to control his temper, and now uses it rarely and forcefully, wielding it as other men may handle a sword. He is an utter fake, through and through. He wears the mask that suits the situation, and changes them like other men change clothes. His free time, if it can truly be called that (as he seldom swerves from his goal of accumulating power) is invested in knowledge. He understands that knowledge brings opportunities, and those opportunities are the path to power. Deep down, he respects those who follow the same path as him, who work with single-minded determination to reach the top and never let it go.

Biography: The county of Velburg is poor. Its people work for subsistence and little more. His family was poor, and though he was an only child thanks to his mother’s untimely death at the hands of the flu, he was never used to luxury or excess. He helped his father manage the estate to earn his keep, and spent what little time he was given free to attend lessons and learn the scriptures, despite his protestations.

At thirteen, his father was killed. The family had borrowed money from another family, having too much pride to turn to bankers, and when that family was denied its repayments, it invested Velburg with soldiers, hundreds of trained and fit men fighting a score of second sons masquerading as guards. His father resisted in a fit of anger or fright, and he was killed. Alexander only learned of the event when he returned from a camping trip in the mountains, so quick was the affair that would change his life forever.
Like any son who loses his parents, he was driven mad. Grief consumed him, and he dedicated himself to revenge while in the constricting clutches of sorrow and desperation: revenge not only against the family who had killed his father, but against the institution that let it happen. He blamed the structure of the world, and decided he needed to rule it to change it. What he would change was not something with which he was concerned at the time. Seeing no other avenue for advancement, he studied desperately for the entrance exams to the Imperial Military Academy. He earned an almost full scholarship. He still needed to sell his mother’s jewels to pay for the tuition.
At the Military Academy, he excelled. He made friends, established connections, and worked as many of his peers as he could into his debt. He made every effort to appear the genius, the invincible. He studied all night, worked all day, learning to fight and speak and act and command. He graduated when he was 16, and shot through the ranks of the army with single-minded determination and heinous, exorbitant corruption. He bribed, blackmailed and stole his gold braid, and spent the political capital he had accumulated over 14 years of service to be named Chief of Staff for what he thought would be a docile, easy-to-control Prince, one at the head of the Army of Northern Electors. He held the role for no more than five months before the Crown Prince was pronounced dead.
Motivation: Alexander wants to rule the world. He hates those above him, and pities those below him in the great chain of being. He dreams of commanding the great masses of humanity, justifying his burning ambition to himself by promising unspecific reforms to vague sections of the population. He can have no man as his equal, and will be named a deity just to have no metaphysical being who stands above him in the hierarchy the unconscious masses decide.

[Zugzwang]

Name: Sixth Prince of the Empire, Sigismund len Ruthweiler, Duke of Kolberg

Age: 23

Caste: Royalty

Occupation: Former Deputy-Chief Researcher at the Royal Chemical Society, Kolberg Branch. Currently General of the Army of the Northern Electors.

Appearance and Personality: Sigismund is a small man, the trappings of youth still present in him. He is lanky, standing taller than most men but weighing significantly less, without the paunch of older officers or the taught muscles of the younger. His skin is naturally pale, free of the common soldier's tan due to his posting to the far north. He wears his uniform smartly, but lacks much of the pomp and circumstance the gold braid would normally suggest. He slouches, and frequently has his hands in his pockets. He moves carefully, always wary of making a mistake, and his trepidation is clear to all those who observe him. His voice is deep, but when he speaks it is either slowly, with pregnant pauses between his words, or quickly, his mind stumbling over what he wants to say before it leaves his mouth. His angular face is topped with a mop of brown hair, perpetually untidy despite constant ministrations. His eyes are large and vibrant green, his mouth looking like it is always on the verge of smiling. When alone, in contemplation or at work, he rarely lets a contented smile leave his face. When speaking, answering questions or dispatching orders, a look of frustrated uncertainty replaces it.

He is a jovial man, deep down. When among friends, in a casual setting, he is quick to joke and quicker to laugh. He prefers to listen than to speak, but is known to hold forth on subjects of particular interest, sometimes longer than his peers would like. He is excitable when dealing with the few matters that hold his interest, and has a long, if grudging, attention span for matters that do not. He respects knowledge and sage wisdom, but idolizes those who innovate and think outside the normal bounds. He thirsts after information, always wanting to learn more about anything he is told. He values bravery and daring in their place, but despite his position still feels the heavy weight of dead men on his shoulders. He is not one for violence himself, and is even more loathe to send others to do violence on his behalf, but does at least understand the realities of his situation. Sigismund does not make friends quickly, though he is perpetually polite, but what friends he manages to collect are cherished by him higher than any others would.

Biography: Sigismund had a happy childhood. The sixth son of the royal family has little expected of him as a child, or at all, really. He lived in the Imperial Palace, playing with his brothers and sisters and those few children who he managed to meet, isolated as he was. He never wanted for anything, and made extensive use of the royal library, working his way from the children's section and the Scriptures to the adventure serials and finally to the histories and sciences. He played with tin soldiers and loved to play checkers. He was always working on a puzzle, and would never stop until they were finished, though he would take breaks of months at a time.

He was educated privately at first, much younger than the other princes. He remembered at five years old, begging to be let into the classroom with his older brothers. He was fascinated, and even when he finally grew bored, as all children do after sitting still for more than ten minutes, he was not put off. He applied himself in all subjects, and as he grew from a precocious child to a prodigious teen he left to study at the Imperial Academy of the Natural Sciences, where he became enamored with the burgeoning field of chemistry.

He graduated at 16, and immediately was granted a post at the Royal Chemistry Society, one with authority not fitting his knowledge. He never exerted his power, and was just content to learn from and debate with the much older, much more knowledgeable scholars. He published his doctoral thesis at 19 after successfully synthesizing urea, earning not insignificant attention from the scientific community.

When he turned 21, his father demanded he take a commission in the army, which he grudgingly accepted. He continued his research while in command, though he had to spend a great deal of his free time actually learning military theory, unwilling to be a imbecilic figurehead. At 23, he quite by chance discovered a mixture of charcoal, sulphur and saltpeter that has the potential to act as a propellant or pyrotechnic. Two weeks later, his favorite older brother was tragically murdered, thrusting him unwilling into the deadly game of succession.

Motivation: When Admar was the Crown Prince and heir apparent, Sigismund had little ambition beyond living a comfortable life and breaking new ground in the field of chemistry. With his older brother dead, he finds himself playing a deadly game, and he is realizing more and more that he wants to win. He would be a better emperor than his failures of older brothers, of that he is certain, and he could right the wrongs so ingrained into the empire. Winning is the only way to guarantee his survival and the survival of those he cares about. Inevitably, but reluctantly, he is starting to realize that he is going to have to rebel against the new Crown Prince, and start a deadly reaction that might blow the empire to smithereens.