Valleian Remnants

Description

The Catastrophe that struck the land of Valleia and turned it into the Broken Plains crumbled the Valleian Empire overnight. It was one of the most powerful nations of its time, one that explored much of the world and played a role in early globalization. They were expert sailors and navigators who had much in the way of trade, piracy and raiding, but they had grown weak. Their travels introduced a variety of foreign religious and political views to the people, and on top of the corruption present in the upper rank's this lead to national instability and inter-city conflict.

Thus when the Catastrophe happened, the Empire quickly crumbled as each faction left the other's to fend for themselves. The now barren lands could no longer support agriculture, and undead stalked the lands. The majority of the people died of either starvation or battle. The survivors either fled south to Middenland or fortified and re-settled some of their broken old settlements, but they have never been the same again. They have lost much of their heritage, and many of their towns and cities still lie in ruins. Those that are occupied have had to build on the ashes of what was previously there. As such, what is generally referenced to as the Valleian Remnants is not a unified state, but a categorization of the tribes and city-states that share a cultural ancestry and history, and still live within their ancestral homelands, ruined as they may be. These tribes often fight or raid each other, and they are frequently raided by the Magvar Empire as well, which keeps them in a fragile position where they are glad to simply be able to hold on to what they have.

Culture

The valleians have lost much of their cultural heritage in the Catastrophe, but the people remembered their ways, their traditions and have passed them on to this day. As prolific raiders and explorers, theirs was a warrior culture centered on personal honor and integrity. This represented both honor in battle, but also in daily life. This code for honor called for total loyalty to the tribe or nation, in order to uphold the survival of the group. Crimes were frequently resolved between people themselves, under the oversight of the local leader. It did not just affect the relation to the group in general either, but also personal bonds. As they viewed honor as a combination of courage and personal integrity, you had to show that were a person of integrity, a person of honor to retain bonds of friendship and family. If others can depend on you, you can depend on them after all. That is what honor is all about to the valleians.

Courage and Death

Another important aspect of honor, was courage. Courage is about facing whatever may come without fear. If life is like a river, then the end of that river is inevitable. Everyone has the freedom to affect their lives, and they should do so, but the end is inevitable. When the time comes, there is no use avoiding it, you should simply face it with courage. That is what shapes someone's honor and character. This is also why they employed resurrection magic only in a few rare cases. Having faced one's death honorably is the most satisfying end one could have, and reversing that would be nothing but a denial of fate and a blemish upon their honor. Curiously enough, this (fatalism as some call it) aligns them more with Hrimrur than most other cultures.

Warrior Ideal and the Soul

As mentioned before, they had a strong warrior culture. Their ideal was a peculiar one, and one that few were able to attain. They believed that a warrior's ideal was to "be like fire" as they put it. To be an instrument that acts on the world around it, but doesn't think on it. Instead they would let their leaders do the thinking, those who were chosen to make the decisions and had the aptitude for it. This ideal supposedly gave them a sense of peace and calm, and it was said that the Dragon-Axes of old as they were sometimes called were nigh unstoppable warriors who were never caught off-guard and expertly cut through battle-lines with no wasted movement at all.

Let your heart roar like a fire,
Fight and live as much as you desire.
Scream defiance with every last breath,
Until you earn your honorable death.

— Valleian oath/battlecry

Regardless of someone's ability to achieve that specifically, there were other views related to this warrior ideal. Another belief that the valleians of old held, was that blade and warrior were one. Having used a blade for so long and to take so many lives, it was believed that a person's soul moved into their weapon over time. Warriors were always buried with their blade, or in some cases even only the blade was buried and not the body. According to old texts they used the blades as a medium to communicate with their ancestors or even to momentarily visit them in their afterlife. Nowadays these beliefs are more rare and the current valleians do not possess knowledge of whether any of this was true, most records having been destroyed or only transferred orally.

Religion

The valleians worshiped a variety of the Fragment-Gods, from war Gods like Cinarus and Alessar to a fertility Goddess like Sicere or a God of death like Rimorbus or Hrimrur. In their current situation, with their lands barren and constantly beset by undead, they naturally tend more towards Gods of war and survival such as Cinarus and Argor. But the God who has gained the most in support, is Hrimrur actually. Their beliefs always aligned well with him to begin with, but his opposition to necromancy and undead falls well with them in particular now as they are both afraid of the undead, but also enraged by their ancestors being forced to rise over and over when they had fought for and deserved their honorable deaths. If there is one thing that all of the remnants of the Valleian Empire have in common then it is this: they hate and detest what was done to their ancestors, and they wish to put them to rest again, both for the honor of the ancestors and their own good.

What Once Was

Alternative Names

Ruins of Valleia

Demonym

Valleians

Location

Broken Plains

Related Ethnicities

• Valleians