Kingdom of Sipur

The Kingdom of Sipur is a nominal monarchy that holds significant influence over central Drisenheim, being the geopolitical equal to the Telzian empire, as well as holding significant influence over the critical channel east of Old Meridia. Historically, Sipur and Telzia have often been at war, which has escalated as of recent days into border skirmishes, as Sipur considers most of eastern Telzian claims to be occupation of independent territory. While the monarch of Sipur holds significant military and diplomatic power, the internal politics of Sipur resemble a kritarchy, with elected judges being responsible for both the creation and enforcement of laws.   Judges are chosen by the monarch, and are organized into courts, typically smaller than five, and hold practically unlimited power over their regions. However, due to the monarch's control of the military, this power is occasionally checked through military action, leading to spars between civilian and military security forces to be common. The monarch is not appointed through primogeniture, but is rather selected from the designated and preferred heir of the previous monarch. The military is responsible for enforcing this choice, though military re-designation of the heir is not uncommon. This system functions in a rather constant state of infighting, but has been stable, with neither the monarch, military, nor judges holding total power historically.   Internally, most citizens either serve under the military or are part of a sweeping number of worker's unions, with a minority serving as part of the judicial system or the monarch's court. The military practically acts as a massive corporation, maintaining both proper military forces and all parts of the logistics chains for those forces, including farmers, tradesmen, and other civilian professions. Those who are not part of this logistics chains are part of the worker's unions, historically created by the judicial system as partially self-governing committee for each regional trade. These unions vary from effective to utterly corrupt. Regardless, most citizens live regimented, though not unpleasant lives, with a hardy social safety net in most regions.