The Kiirn

The first skyship to carry cannons.

The Harani took to the skies with very little in the way of armaments. Really the crew only had a few handheld weapons to use in their defense. They didn't expect to encounter any large resistance and certainly no hostile skyships. After that it became an unspoken rule that the nations wouldn't militarize the skies, a rule that lasted for decades.

— Nim, Half a Century of Skyships

Dangerous Skies

Thirty-four years passed between the maiden voyage of the first skyship and the completion of the Kiirn. In that time the skies had become increasingly dangerous. Bral had launched attacks in the colonies, new hazards had been discovered among the skies, and - most importantly - various stolen skyships had united to become the Stormfleet pirate group. The Burim Council needed a way to ensure the safety of their ships, cargo, and hold on their colonies. With that in mind, the Kiirn was built differently that her predecessors.

A New Ship for a New Age

The Kiirn was built in the utmost secrecy, not even the Machine Priests saw it until they installed the floatdrive. Resdesigned from the bow to the rudder, the Kiirn was a sturdy ship built to haul not only vast amounts cargo but also to carry the immense weight of cannons.
The other nations were not concerned with the increased resilience of the ships - which they had also been working to improve - only with the inclusion of arms designed to take out other skyships. They also feared that it could be used to attack any of the settlements built near the edges of the skyislands - some were worried that Darapur itself would be attacked.

Protests in the Streets

While some people of Burim - such as a young Karnaster Evulbrung - objected to their government's breaking of the unspoken rule most followed their leader's rhetoric about how the interests of Burim needed to be protected. As the word got out, the people of the other nations took to the streets demanding that the Kiirn be taken out of commission or that they begin to outfit their ships with weapons as well.
For many who had a say in the comissioning and constructing of skyships this was the excuse they needed to begin building combat-capable vessels and retrofitting older ones to at least have the option to carry cannons. It wasn't long before every skyship was at least capable of combat - save one. The Harani and her crew were lost and was never equipped with ship-to-ship weapons; some say this is how she remained the one ship that truly embodied the spirit of exploration.

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Stuck in the Dead Sky

During one of her many voyages the Kiirn became stuck in a region of dead sky and called for help. The disastrous rescue mission returned only the ship and not any of her crew.

The True First

The Kiirn wasn't actually the first skyship to carry large weapons, it was simply the first one owned by one of the nations of Breharan to do so. The honour - or rather dishonour - of first weaponized skyship goes to the Stormfleet who obtained several cannons from a merchant selling used military equipment from Grara.
The pirates posed as representatives of the Ostad county's ruling body, used the general lack of knowledge of the territory to bolster their ruse, and purchased the used cannons at a bargain price and the money they paid with had been obtained by looting the merchants of Grara.

"This is how this glorious time of exploration will end, not with a full map, not with knowledge, not with understanding, not even with honour.
This era dies staring at the barrel of a gun."

— Karnaster Evulbrung

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