花园 Heavenly Sphere of the Huāyuán 花园
Government
The Heavenly Sphere of Huayuan is a complex and vast nation, ruled what could be summarised as a scholastic-aristocratic oligarchy. The position of head of state, the Grand Tutor is elected by the Three Excellencies, ministries comprised of upper-level scholar-aristocrats representing the Ministry of Balanced Grace (Executive/law-enacting), Ministry of Tranquil Harmony (Judiciary, law-enforcing), and the Ministry of Heavenly Rite (Legislative/law-creating), and as such Huayuan possess a degree of separation of powers in government. The Grand Tutor must be a professor of one of the Heavenly Spheres numerous academies, ascetic monastery-fortresses or bureaucratic institutes, and besides the election process (by the ministry members) must also pass a rigorous and arduous testing and examination phase. The Grand Tutor must also possess a Celestial Pedigree of the First Degree, that is to say an exceptionally pure bloodline with a direct line of descent to one of the Celestial Dragons (Primordial God-Dragons).
Beyond this legalistic system however, are the Kings of the Four Seasons, also known as the Seasonal Kings. Not actual kings, the Seasonal Kings are very old hermit philosophers that live in famous but isolated monastery-fortresses. Former Grand Tutors, they possess immense influence and referral power. All four Seasonal Kings are not of the Huan people (Elves) but are instead Wyrms, highly intelligent cousins of the original Celestial Dragons. Simple phrases from their tongue have entirely shifted national policy in the past, with the populace considering them messianic or demi-god like figures. Even the Grand Tutor bows before their presence whenever they seek the Seasonal King’s counsel.
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
Geography
Foreign Cartographers and military strategists alike rage at the mention of the Heavenly Sphere's unwillingness to share mapping information, and aggressiveness in destroying anything and anyone that would spread information of the Heavenly Sphere's interior.
Dōngjì, The Northern Mountains and the Winter Palace 冬季
Dōngjì is a mountainous region, where the great Huàfēn mountains continue to reach across from the western steppes and the deserts of the Khandarai savages. The region is relatively temperate due to the rain falling on this side of the mountains, leaving the area heavily wooded and littered with small creeks, streams, wild gardens and hot springs, though in winter much of this is covered in snow. The north is a militarised region, the Huan here living in fortified hill-towns. Regional leadership is mostly represented in the great Huàfēn monastery-fortresses hidden in the peaks and snow of the north, where the ascetic monks share their abodes with scholar-aristocrats and bureaucratic functionaries that administer the nearby towns, military forts and militarised small cities of the north. The north’s regional capital is the Winter Palace, where the Northern Seasonal King meditates in his deep spiritual trance, the elder wyrm isolated from society in his meditation chamber.
Qiūjì, The Western Steppes and the Autumn Palace 秋季
Qiūjì is a partially mountainous, partially arid region, with the great Huàfēn mountains receding into cold steppes and then plains. Even more militarised than the north, the Western Steppes has been repeatedly raided and assaulted by the Khandarai savages, particularly along the coast where the great outer wall cannot protect them. The people here are more xenophobic than all the other regions of the Heavenly Sphere, with close-knit family and community units living inside isolated walled and subterranean homesteads, living off goats as they stockpile food underground in preparation for winter or invasion by the evil western savages. The military is powerful here, fortresses and forts are the centre of rule instead of monasteries. The Western Seasonal King resides here, ever watchful, waiting - prepared for the next Flower War between Huayuan and Khandarai. The pacifism of the other lands are foolish, they can only be prepared to kill all the savages when they inevitably come again.
Xiàjì, The Southern Valley and the Summer Palace 夏季
Xiàjì is an extremely fertile region of Huayuan, actually located in the south-east peninsula, Xiàjì is nestled between two long mountain ranges. A combination of lush forests and farmland, as well as some wetlands, Xiàjì is often considered the most beautiful part of the country, covered in exotic flowers, plantlife, animals, water bodies and architecture - further aided by being the Joyous’ schools centre of power. Xiàjì is a land of art, music, festivals and trade. In particular, the land is unique for having the sole city (and part of the country) open to foreigners - the trade city of Huángjīn dì, where numerous foreign traders, mercenary groups, privateers and adventurers have taken residence, assuming they passed the civility exams. The ninja clans also have many of their bases located here, where they can recruit Hùnxiě halfbreeds with ease due to the presence of foreigners. The Southern Seasonal King often moves between the Summer Palace, a vast mountain monastery-palace complex and Huángjīn dì the trade city, as well as other regions of Xiàjì, enjoying interacting with the many peoples of the peninsula. Of the four Seasonal Kings, the Summer King has the most desire to influence the regional government, preferring to often politely ‘suggest’ options to the regions scholar-aristocrats.
Tánhuáng, The Eastern Fields and the Spring Palace 弹簧
Tánhuáng, the core and heart of the Heavenly Sphere. It reaches across the east to the centre, the extremely populous centre of the Heavenly Sphere (and west side of Tánhuáng) hidden behind the Wall of Immemorial Might, while vast fields, farmlands and light forests stretch across all of Tánhuáng. Famous for making up nearly as much people as the other three regions combined, Tánhuáng is dotted with highly urbanised cities and large towns, both outside and within the Immemorial walls. Dozens of academies, universities and medical schools dot the region, ancient monastery-fortresses inhabited by many monks and scholar-aristocrats. The Tánhuáng Huan people pride themselves for being the most educated, civilised and organised of the Heavenly Sphere’s peoples, so long as they keep out all the filthy savages and lesser races. They care not for what happens beyond the Immemorial wall, no war, no raids, no anything. Only Tánhuáng and its splendid isolation matters. The Eastern Seasonal King lives within the urban palace/monastery complex of the capital city of Mígōng, where once the old Wyrm Dragon Emperors ruled from, surrounded by the hoard of books, scrolls and treasures within the Great Library of Infallible Wisdom.
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
Culture
The Walled Garden
Huayuan is a reclusive, secretive and cutoff part of the world, and so much of its culture and traditions are wildly different, partially due to this isolation and partially because Huayuan never fell to the Lynnde Empire. Even before its three hundred years of self-imposed isolation, Huayuan was always a strange place, though instead of isolation it waged aggresive wars on foreign powers, particularly the Serenist "False Light" menance. Firstly of note, is Huayuan’s xenophobia. The people of Huayuan in general see all outsiders as barbarian savages, regardless of their technological level. This xenophobia partially derives from the previously noted one thousand year holy war against the Serenist Powers, but also includes their preceived racial supremacy deriving from their Primordial blood purity. Humans in particular, being the main agents of the False Light, are looked down upon as a brutish and uncivilised race, that only defile and corrupt the world under the pretense of "Serenism". The people of Huayuan are convinced that they are the most civilised, educated and graceful people in the universe, and that their civilisation is a treasured jewel among the dirt and scum of the outside world - thus it must be closed off and protected.
This is further compounded by the Prophetess’ warnings three centuries ago. While some ignored her and others went off to fight an unknown enemy, the Huayuan Empire of the day receded into itself, retreating into self-imposed isolation, believing that the great enemy was in fact Serenism, and the prophecy revealed that their wars against the east were for nothing. Already a heavily defended and walled nation, the Huayuan Empire became a virtual fortress of a nation, with ring wall after ring wall built, canals, counterintelligence agencies, among many other defences - including the famous Wall of Immemorial Might, a massive wall separating the heavily populated inner cities from the rest of the nation. The Huan people within isolated themselves, preparing for what they believed would soon be the final war.
Cherished Knowledge
Huayuan culture cherishes beauty - both aesthetic and spiritual, as well as knowledge. When the Celestial Dragons and their Wyrm descendants bestowed knowledge upon the Huan people, they jealously guarded this secret knowledge, knowing full well (See Tranquilism religion info) that it was this knowledge and civility that protected them from the Original Chaos. The teachings of the old primordial dragons became the groundwork for the religious beliefs of the Huan. Medical practice was made sacred. Meditation and reading as prayer. Farming and crop rotation a symbol of life and death. When combined with their xenophobia, the Huan peoples quest and reverence of knowledge has led to them archiving and stockpiling secret lore and information, denying outsiders information and destroying any evidence or information outside their walls, lest those corrupted by the False Light use the information against them.
Celestial Pedigree
The Huan, elven peoples of the walled gardens are a cousin species of humans, who they see as inferior ape people. The Huan have a very high level of primordial blood, owing to their interbreeding with shapeshifting primordials, careful blood purity-conserving policies, extreme isolation from the outside world and incestuous unions. They are tall and lithe people with large pointed ears, with occasional mutations including horns. Socially, the nation has incorporated blood purity into its politics and social norms, with social ‘blood-castes’ determined by your Celestial Pedigree, or how pure your blood is, with a First Degree being directly related to a Celestial Dragon or Wyrm. The Three Excellencies and many of the scholastic institutes of Huayuan require a certain Celestial Pedigree. A notable exception are the secretice ninja clans that serve as the Heavenly Spheres spies, assassins and external intelligence agency. The Ninja clans often forcibly recruit half-breed ‘Hùnxiě’ 混血, very low celestial Pedigree Huan, being half-human - the reason being that they are better at infiltrating the foreign savages nations.
School of the Ascetics
The Ascetic School is a philosophical, religious and political organisation and doctrine that dominates Huayuan’s scholastic elite. An ideology that preaches reservedness, calm, stoicism, purity and personal and well as social harmony as a path to spiritual peace and as such maintaing the relationship with their gods in all things (including themselves), the Ascetic school is based in various academies and particularly monastery-fortresses. Monks, Scholar-aristocrats and bureaucrats often follow its practices of intense meditation, fasting, trances, literature, and rhetoric. Emotion while not evil is considered chaotic and as such impure in excess. Extreme cleanliness, orderly living spaces, clean food, polite mannerism and blood purity are also all essential elements of the schools teaching. The Grand Tutor as well as three of the four Seasonal Kings are all adherents of the Ascetic School (with one of the four Seasonal Kings being the schools founder and leader). The Ascetic schools isolationist pacifist beliefs have strongly influenced the Heavenly Sphere’s foreign relations, as the nation both refuses to interact with other nations but also has a policy against launching offensive wars.
School of the Joyous
The Joyous School is a philosophical, religious and political organisation and doctrine that holds a minority counter-culture position among Huayuan’s scholastic elite, though dominates the warrior, artist and craftsmen castes. An ideology that preaches expression, love, romanticism, beauty, diversity and willpower as a path to spiritual happiness and a means of maintaing their relationship with the gods in all things (including themselves), it is a ‘rebel’ school mostly growing in in the middle-castes of skilled labourers and craftsmen, theatre performers, dancers, artists as well as the growing warrior-poet/artists of the Heavenly Sphere’s military. The Joyous School’s practices include calligraphy, theatre, poetry, tea ceremonies, numerous festivals venerating different professions, ritual battle, martial arts and courting. Adherents are expected to express and venerate beauty, regardless if it is artistic, architectural, militaristic, physical or any other form of beauty. The Joyous School has limited political influence, however it has significant influence in the southern provinces and one (and youngest) of the four Seasonal Kings is a practitioner. While having limited influence on the Heavenly Sphere’s foreign policy, through the Seasonal King of the Souths counsel, the Joyous School was able to enable the creation of the free trade city of Huángjīn dì.
Hidden Eyes of the Heavenly Sphere
The Heavenly Sphere employs numerous intelligence agencies, ranging from infamous Hùnxiě half-breed ninjas, child urchins, surgical magi doctor-assassins and the even more infamous Jiangshi secret police officers, silent enforcers of the three centuries isolation. A land of hidden eyes and hands, silencing anyone who would dare disturb the tranquil peace of the Walled Garden or threaten the existence of the universe, within or without. For these practioners of espionage and death, the Long War against the False Light never ended, it merely became quieter and hidden away from the public's eyes.
The Jiangshi, life-siphoning and illusionist magi secret police, tasked with eliminating threats to the security and secrecy of the Heavenly Sphere within its confines and from traitors within its own ranks. The Jiangshi being an armed wing of the Ministry of Tranquil Harmony is headed by the Secretary-Minister of Tranquil Harmony, and as such is deeply involved in the law enforcement of Huayuan. The Jiangshi are also responsible for the protection and preservation of Huanese cultural and Tranquilist religious heritage, and as such maintain numerous cultural societies and police forces for this purpose. The Jiangshi are furthermore involved in border security (observing foreigners) and have some periphery influence on the military, including the presence of adjutant 'morale' officers. Overall, the Jiangshi are dedicated to being safeguards against the Great Lie and the enemy of the Long War, seeking out and destroying any corruption of the False Light within the Heavenly Sphere.
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
Military
The regular army of the Heavenly Sphere, comprised of the lower blood castes urban conscripts, lower blood caste serfs and petty merchants/peddlers and craftsmen pushed into service by their masters. The banner army consists of four parts, being the White, Yellow, Red and Blue banner armies, each being drawn from one of the four regions of the Heavenly Sphere. The Banner Armies are a large force and suprisingly well armed for a conscript army (due to the purchasing of equipment being partially subsidised by the state), however on the downside are also insulated by the fact that they rarely actually fight in major conflicts and have nearly never gone into any foreign environment. Considering the Heavenly sphere's huge population and centralised government policies, the Banner Armies in times of war could be even further enlarged by en masse conscription, potentially becoming one of the largest military forces in the world.
Banner Infantry
Banner Cavalry
Qiūjì Bannermen
The mobilised scholar-aristocrats often form the elite of any defensive Huayuan army. Being provoked by invaders, these Huan members of the high celestial pedigral castes have come down from their mountain monastries and palaces; put on their ancestral enchanted armour, armed themselves with semi-legendary weapons and mounted their carefully bred horses or lindworms. All scholar elites are essentially spellswords, wielding both magically enchanted weapons as well as their own magical powers against enemies. Depending on which school they belong to, Scholar Elites are often engage in regular meditation and calming excersises (Ascetic) or fight with highly exagerated, artistic combat styles (Joyous).
Scholar-Elite (Ascetic)
Scholar-Elite (Joyous)
Scholar-Elite Cataphracts
Scholar-Elite (Ascetic)
Scholar-Elite (Joyous)
Scholar-Elite Cataphracts
Ascetic Warrior Monks
Wayfare-Poet (Joyous)
Wayfare-Poet (Joyous)
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
Religion - Tranquilism
It is a historical fact that the old Huayuanese Empire was ruled directly by the Celestial Dragons and Primordials. It has long been recorded in thousands of texts that a Draconic God-Emperor and court of primordial dragon gods guided the Huan as benefactors, teacher-deities and ancestoral beings of the Huan, the source of their divine bloodline and lineage and by their presence guarding them from the Original Chaos that lied beyond. As the Primordials faded away however, the religious beliefs of the Huan had to morph with the changing times. Now, the dominant faith is known as Tranquilism, from which both the Ascetic and Joyous philosophical schools are a part of. In Tranquilism, it is the belief that the Primordials did not die but ascended into a universal form to prolong their innate powers of life and creation, therefore protecting the world from the Original Chaos while avoiding the Original Chaos' mortal godslaying instruments. The Celestial Dragons, the greatest of the Primordials and gods of the universe (greater than all other primordials) became the spiritual/animistic entities within all Huan, as they intended when they created the Huan. Their gods reside within them and their blood (or otherwise personally or familiy attached, like a spirit guide), as proven by the great magical boons gained by purer blood. It as such essential in Tranquilism to protect this blood and achieve internal peace or happiness or otherwise achieving what is known as 'positive tranquility' or inward perfection, as a way of pleasing the gods and in return the gods within everyone will give them boons and continue to protect them from the chaos beyond.
Tranquilism puts great emphasis on the personal relationship between tranquilists and their gods. It is believed that every Huan (and in the more liberal circles of the faith, all life) have personal gods within themselves or attached to their families, watching over them and guiding them. A common practice as such is to build household shrines rather than great temples or churches, customised and personal shrines dedicated to specific household gods. Children in families are raised to see their own personal god as an extension of their family or an additional parent or grandparent for whom they must honour for their whole lives, in exchange for affection, wisdom and protection as the old Primordial gods gave before they ascended to their current form.
Once in the beginning, many aeons ago, the cosmos was flawed and only half made, filled with chaos - The Original Chaos, which is either a malicious anti-deity or natural force of chaos, though the scriptures are not entirely certain. Regardless, From this void even the greatest beings struggled to survive. The Primordials, the gods of this world, were born in the beginning of time as stragglers in this aether of void, darkness and destruction. The Primordials battled for supremacy in this darkness, spilling divine blood, blood that would eventually form the oceans and from there the lands of the whole world.
As they battled and the world came into being, so did the mortals, rising from the bloody oceans and corpse-laden dirt. The Primordials, endowed with the power of creation, the true root of all magic, gradually filled in the holes in reality, and with the power of creation and life, pushed back the Original Chaos, one lifeform at a time. Of these Primordials, the Celestial Dragons were the greatest - not because of their power of the others, but their wisdom, benevolence and foresight. They understood that it was their powers of creation and life that was pushing back the Original Chaos. Through persuasion, rhetoric and the arts of the tongue, the Celestial Dragons banded the Primordials together into the First Pantheon, and together waged a war against the Original Chaos.
The Primordials, in their benevolence and desire to protect their creations, bestowed upon them the same life-giving tools of creation. Wielding magic drawn from primordial blood, the mortals spread far and wide. The Original Chaos, in its impotent and perhaps mindless rage could do nothing. It was cast out, shutting out its influence on the world. The Primordials and their mortal creations were triumphant.
A golden age begun, now more commonly known as the Era of Legends. The Primordial First Pantheon ruled over the whole of the world, their presence and will holding back the Original Chaos and its feeble attempts to again creep into the world. The world in these days were pure and completed, but the Primordials knew that the great enemy always waited. So they shaped and refined the world ever more grandly. The Celestial Dragons taught the mortals of civilisation, of the languages and the seasons so they may harvest crops. As laws and systems formed, the creeping lies of the Original Chaos was drowned out again and again.
But the Era of Legends would not last on forever. The Primordials who loved their creations and eventually children so dearly were blinded by it. Endowed with free will and their own desires, mortal whims soon influenced and so corrupted the Primordials, who lost sight of the greater purpose. The First Pantheon fell to civil war as the Primordials sought to protect and provide for their children, the mortals who now waged their own wars.
Even the Celestial Dragons were not immune. They warned their children, the enlightened and perfected Huan that they should build great walls to protect themselves and the harmony they had built. Many thousands of texts and scrolls were written to warn the mortals of the Original Chaos, that once again spewed forth from the cracks made by the Primordial’s civil war.
The great holy wars between the Huan and the Lynnde further represented the darkest days of the Primordial Civil War. But they were but the beginning for the horrors that were to come. For hidden away, the Original Chaos had slipped its influence into the hands of the mortals. So corrupted by their will and the civil war, they betrayed the Primordials.
For the first time in aeons, Primordials died. For the first time, wielding eldritch powers from the Original Chaos beyond the mortal planes of existence, mortal life slew Primordials. As each Primordial fell, the very foundations of the world shoke. The corrupted mortals fell to the false light of their own making. A Great Lie was made, a false serenity so to allow the soft, silent death of all things without protest. The powers of creation once wielded by the Primordials dimmed as each fell, and the Original Chaos in turn grew stronger. Where it once receded, the Original Chaos followed wherever the False Light of the Great Lie spread.
Knowing that the end times had come, the Celestial Dragons and the remaining Primordials formed a grand scheme to protect life. Knowing that the Original Chaos sought the destruction of the whole world, using their mortal instruments to destroy the very foundations of all life, the Celestial Dragons and the remaining Primordials used their great world-shaping and transformative powers to redesign their very existence so to deny it of its prize.
The Primordials dispersed themselves, their forms becoming universal and integrated with all life. They became the earth, the trees. They condensed into chosen places of importance. Others hid inside objects. Shrines, swords and the very blood of their children. Here they would continue to guide their children and through their existence prolong the universe in the hopes that the mortal instruments of the Original Chaos died and faded away.
For just over a thousand years, the world has remained in this state, however the life of the world is fading. The Celestial Dragons ploy was merely a means of delaying the inevitable. The False Light continued to spread. The Prophetess warned of the great horde of the east, followers of the Great Lie in even greater numbers. The very fabric of reality was tearing itself apart with famines and plagues.
And so, the Huan closed themselves off. They shut the gates of their great walls and prepared. Prepared for the last war against the False Light, enticing all mortals into its silent, peaceful embrace of death.
As they battled and the world came into being, so did the mortals, rising from the bloody oceans and corpse-laden dirt. The Primordials, endowed with the power of creation, the true root of all magic, gradually filled in the holes in reality, and with the power of creation and life, pushed back the Original Chaos, one lifeform at a time. Of these Primordials, the Celestial Dragons were the greatest - not because of their power of the others, but their wisdom, benevolence and foresight. They understood that it was their powers of creation and life that was pushing back the Original Chaos. Through persuasion, rhetoric and the arts of the tongue, the Celestial Dragons banded the Primordials together into the First Pantheon, and together waged a war against the Original Chaos.
The Primordials, in their benevolence and desire to protect their creations, bestowed upon them the same life-giving tools of creation. Wielding magic drawn from primordial blood, the mortals spread far and wide. The Original Chaos, in its impotent and perhaps mindless rage could do nothing. It was cast out, shutting out its influence on the world. The Primordials and their mortal creations were triumphant.
A golden age begun, now more commonly known as the Era of Legends. The Primordial First Pantheon ruled over the whole of the world, their presence and will holding back the Original Chaos and its feeble attempts to again creep into the world. The world in these days were pure and completed, but the Primordials knew that the great enemy always waited. So they shaped and refined the world ever more grandly. The Celestial Dragons taught the mortals of civilisation, of the languages and the seasons so they may harvest crops. As laws and systems formed, the creeping lies of the Original Chaos was drowned out again and again.
But the Era of Legends would not last on forever. The Primordials who loved their creations and eventually children so dearly were blinded by it. Endowed with free will and their own desires, mortal whims soon influenced and so corrupted the Primordials, who lost sight of the greater purpose. The First Pantheon fell to civil war as the Primordials sought to protect and provide for their children, the mortals who now waged their own wars.
Even the Celestial Dragons were not immune. They warned their children, the enlightened and perfected Huan that they should build great walls to protect themselves and the harmony they had built. Many thousands of texts and scrolls were written to warn the mortals of the Original Chaos, that once again spewed forth from the cracks made by the Primordial’s civil war.
The great holy wars between the Huan and the Lynnde further represented the darkest days of the Primordial Civil War. But they were but the beginning for the horrors that were to come. For hidden away, the Original Chaos had slipped its influence into the hands of the mortals. So corrupted by their will and the civil war, they betrayed the Primordials.
For the first time in aeons, Primordials died. For the first time, wielding eldritch powers from the Original Chaos beyond the mortal planes of existence, mortal life slew Primordials. As each Primordial fell, the very foundations of the world shoke. The corrupted mortals fell to the false light of their own making. A Great Lie was made, a false serenity so to allow the soft, silent death of all things without protest. The powers of creation once wielded by the Primordials dimmed as each fell, and the Original Chaos in turn grew stronger. Where it once receded, the Original Chaos followed wherever the False Light of the Great Lie spread.
Knowing that the end times had come, the Celestial Dragons and the remaining Primordials formed a grand scheme to protect life. Knowing that the Original Chaos sought the destruction of the whole world, using their mortal instruments to destroy the very foundations of all life, the Celestial Dragons and the remaining Primordials used their great world-shaping and transformative powers to redesign their very existence so to deny it of its prize.
The Primordials dispersed themselves, their forms becoming universal and integrated with all life. They became the earth, the trees. They condensed into chosen places of importance. Others hid inside objects. Shrines, swords and the very blood of their children. Here they would continue to guide their children and through their existence prolong the universe in the hopes that the mortal instruments of the Original Chaos died and faded away.
For just over a thousand years, the world has remained in this state, however the life of the world is fading. The Celestial Dragons ploy was merely a means of delaying the inevitable. The False Light continued to spread. The Prophetess warned of the great horde of the east, followers of the Great Lie in even greater numbers. The very fabric of reality was tearing itself apart with famines and plagues.
And so, the Huan closed themselves off. They shut the gates of their great walls and prepared. Prepared for the last war against the False Light, enticing all mortals into its silent, peaceful embrace of death.
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
Heroes
Ao Run, Seasonal King of the South
Ao Qin, Seasonal King of the East
Ao Shun, Seasonal King of the West (Superior Hero)
Ito Ryou, Exiled Legend
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
History
Thousands of years ago, from the fertile fields of central Tánhuáng, the small kingdoms first made contact with the Celestial Dragons, the primordial gods of the ancient times. The Celestial Dragons found these primitive small kingdomers and molded them from savageness into greatness. The Celestial Dragons taught great wisdom to the small kingdomers. The arts, the sciences. Medicine, farming and words. The laws of both man and the universe. The gods remade the small-kingdomers, siring new, purer beings. Gifted with pure blood and the many foundations of civilisation, the Huan became a model for the Primordial's world without the influence of the Original Chaos.
For a time the Tánhuángese people were peaceful, but it did not last. The Empire of Lynnde was a ferocious and expanionist entity, its ambitions engulfing the world. The Huan, directed by their Celestial Dragon gods would answer in kind. What begun first as a noble goal of protecting southern Askor soon became the Huan's own empire-building project. Blessed with their progenitor god’s blood, awesome magical power and leadership, the Tánhuángese Huan peoples marched out of the Tánhuáng in great number, eventually uniting all of modern-day Huayuan into the Huayuanese Empire.
Building great walls, fleets and armies, the Huayuanese Empire would go on to wage war with the Lynnde Empire over the hegemony of the south. In the final great war between the two empires, the Huayuanese Empire and its coalition of south-western states was able to push the Lynnde Empire out of the neighbouring Vangren at great cost to both sides. Soon after the Lynnde Empire fell and the primordials vanished with it.
A period of global chaos followed as Serenism rose and the Huayuanese Empire became paralysied with the absence of their godly patrons. The Wyrms, Lung Dragon children of their godly masters filled in where the Celestial Dragons left off, but Huayuan was unable to halt the rise of Serenism due to its own religious chaos.
Eventually, Tranquilism rose as Huayuan's faith, and its rise to prominence also led to its rejection of Serenism as the 'Great Lie' and 'False Light' of the world. The Huayuanese Empire over time receded into itself. It maintained relations and at times interfered with its neighbours; mostly notably its military intervertions into Lynnde-Naraksh, but each passing year it continued to further close itself off. until eventually, 300 years ago, it shut its doors and borders completely. The Prophetess' visions and the plagues and famines convinced the Huanese that the False Light's influence on the world had become so great that the end of the world was in progress. They believed furthermore that the great conflict from the east would be the Serenists' false light marching out to destroy the world. As such, the Huayuanese Empire became the Heavenly Sphere, an isolationist state that has existed to preserve its culture and purity in preparation for that final destined battle... a battle which the Sphere's leadership believe has finally come. The sleeping giant is slowly awakening once more.
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
Relations
Vallenguin: Protectorate
Vangren: Protectorate
Empire of Lynn-Naraksh: Ally
Emerald Empire: Certified Trader
Freishaan: Certified Trader
Utrye: Certified Trader
Tarkima: Neutral/Unknown
Argentum Knights: Neutral
Crossroads: Neutral
Yngvar: Neutral
Mortkt: Neutral
Atharia: Trade Embargoed
Ollira: Trade Embargoed
Osentia: Hostile
Vlaanburg: Hostile
Matathran: Hostile
Lynnefaire: Hostile
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
==================================================[~~~]==================================================
Characters
Ao Huáng, Seasonal King of the North
