MYSTERIOUS, GLAMOROUS, ENTICING… AND CORRUPT TO THE BONE – NIAMEDIANS ARE THE LIVING EXAMPLE HOW ONE SHOULD NOT JUDGE A BOOK BY ITS COVER… EVEN IF IT MAY BE GILDED.
The Niamedian Theocracy
The Niamedian Theocracy (more commonly known as just Niamedia or the Theocracy; formerly known as the Niamedian Kingdom) is an archipelago consisting of three smaller, sparsely inhabited northern islands and one long southern island where the majority of the population resides. At the very south of the main island lies the Haverham Peninsula, home to the capital city, Port Haverham.
The island’s steep, mountainous terrain historically made agriculture difficult, forcing the Niamedians to turn to naval trade. This early focus on commerce allowed Niamedia to grow wealthy and sophisticated, with its ports becoming the primary centers of trade in the region. Despite their prosperity, the Niamedians were deeply pious, granting their Church considerable influence over the monarchy. This influence eventually culminated in the Crimson Coup, during which the Church seized full political control, establishing the isolated theocracy that remains today.
The Theocracy is led by the High Priest, who oversees a Council of priests representing towns across the nation. Each town has a priest acting as both spiritual guide and civic authority, reporting to the Council and serving as a local alderman and bailiff. Meanwhile, the so-called Free Houses, remnants of Niamedia’s former nobility, still exist. Historically, these families were ennobled for services to the monarchy. Though the high nobility was executed or exiled during the Crimson Coup, the Free Houses remain as a reminder of the nation’s aristocratic past.
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[Show]History
Early Magic and the Old Ancestors
During the era of the Old Ancestors, Niamedia developed necromancy and dendromancy, magical abilities unique from mainland powers like shapeshifting or elemental manipulation. These powers were highly potent, elevating those born with them into early leadership roles.
Seeking to strengthen these abilities in future generations, Niamedia began conquering mainland territories — particularly Vascavania — and importing their inhabitants as slaves to “enhance” noble bloodlines. This practice ensured that magical abilities remained concentrated in aristocratic families.
This exploitation triggered a large-scale revolt. The rebelling slaves overthrew Niamedian dominance on the Mainland; Niamedia lost its mainland holdings and reverted to isolation. A temporary council formed, eventually evolving into the Niamedian Kingdom, with the Church already wielding significant influence. In the meantime, Vascavania made use of the technology shared with them via contact with the Niamedians, and in the centuries to come, Vascavania rose to become the most powerful empire on the Continent.
Rise of the Church
The victorious slaves, many from Vascavania, partially adopted the Niamedian religion while incorporating their own beliefs. This fusion laid the foundation of the Niamedian Church, which eventually became the dominant force in the nation. With Niamedia isolated, a fragmented council temporarily ruled until the Kingdom could reestablish itself.
The Niamedian Kingdom and the Crimson Coup
The Kingdom was ruled by five royal houses, with the strongest king serving as King-Protector, maintaining peace among the others. Each king had a Church-appointed priest-advisor, together forming the high Council. The rest of the nobility served as vassals. Niamedia flourished despite internal tensions — until the rise of expansionist Vascavania.
When the Vascavanian Empire offered an alliance that would have reduced Niamedia to a vassal state, the nobility hesitated. The Church, fearing a loss of influence under Vascavanian oversight, manipulated public opinion against the kings. Citizens, convinced the rulers were traitors, rose in a rebellion secretly supported by the priests. This uprising, the Crimson Coup, resulted in execution of most high nobles, exile of surviving nobles to Vascavania, and the formation of a new Council by priest-advisors, which lay the foundations of what would soon become the Niamedian Theocracy.
Vascavania, fearing uprisings by the powerful Niamedian exiles, sought Church guidance on controlling magic-users. In return for allowing Niamedia sovereignty, the Church provided methods for managing and suppressing powered individuals.
After the Coup, many powered individuals remained in Niamedia. Rather than eliminate all magical talent, the Church created Institutes, schools where children with powers were trained and indoctrinated, effectively creating state-controlled magic users. Only necromancy remains forbidden, and necromancers face relentless persecution.
Current era
Niamedia is a theocratic state, controlling its population through religious authority and regulation of magic. Though isolated, it maintains a delicate peace with Vascavania. Internally, tensions simmer between the Church, Free Houses, and more independent northern regions, while magical training ensures the state maintains control over future generations.
Geography
Despite its location in the south of the Continent, the Niamedian archipelago has a chilly climate, caused by its tall, snow-capped mountains. These mountains are rich in minerals, long exploited by the Niamedians. Fast rivers cascade down rocky slopes, bleeding into lakes in the valleys, where most towns and cities are located. Fog is common, especially in the colder months, which has led newer settlements to be built on plateaus for clearer weather.
The three northern islands — Narva, Yonire, and Ilyrana — feature steppe-like terrain, with rolling grasslands and occasional hills. Their mild climate and fertile soil make them Niamedia’s granaries. Church influence is comparatively minimal here, attracting Niamedians seeking more freedom from religious oversight.
Notable towns
- Port Haverham - The capital and largest city, located on the southern Haverham Peninsula. Historically prosperous through trade with Vascavania and the Kingdom of Iepla, its commerce has diminished since the Crimson Coup. Despite reduced trade, it remains elegant, safe, and culturally significant.
- Heilbury – The second-largest city, located in northern Niamedia. Long overseen by House Falkborne, the viscountship remains hereditary within the family. Following the mysterious death of Lord Ambrose, Lady Genevieve Falkborne now serves as Viscountess. With no male heir, the continuity of House Falkborne is uncertain.
- Hallgeburgh – A small, picturesque town in southern Niamedia, traditionally governed by House Gilith. The Gilith baron has little influence over civic matters, instead relying on the extensive lands held around the town. The current baron is Lord Meris Gilith.
Society & Culture
To the rest of the Continent, the Niamedians — sometimes mockingly called Theocrats — are known as pious, reserved, and impeccably mannered people who prefer to keep to themselves. Their relations with neighboring nations are famously cold, largely due to the populace’s unwavering devotion to the Church. To outsiders, this devotion borders on blindness, as the Church’s manipulation and corruption are plain for all to see. Yet many high-born Niamedians tolerate, or even encourage, this system, making use of bribery to escape prosecution under Church Law. Since Church Law is the only legal code in the Theocracy, it is not unheard of for poor commoners to be punished harshly for offenses that wealthy aristocrats simply pay to have erased.
The steep mountains of the archipelago have pushed most Niamedians toward the sea. Since ancient times, they have been known as fiercely independent sailors and cunning merchants. Their land’s tremendous economic potential, however, has long been stifled by the Church’s dominance. High taxes fill the treasury of the clergy, whose wealth and influence eventually became great enough to topple the monarchy during the Crimson Coup. In the centuries since, the Church has held Niamedia in an iron grip, its manipulation so absolute that the rest of the Continent has grown both bitter and wary of its reach.
Niamedian clothing reflects a blend of late Victorian and early Edwardian styles (ca. 1870–1900). Their technology level parallels the mid-to-late Victorian era as well, with sophisticated craftsmanship, industrialized cities, and a growing reliance on steam-powered infrastructure. Although urban life dominates, remote mountain villages still exist, especially in the North — often inhabited by those seeking distance from the Church and its all-pervasive laws.
Socially, Niamedia presents a far darker picture. The Church’s corruption has seeped into every layer of society, reshaping the nation into a rigidly patriarchal and deeply misogynistic state. Women possess almost no legal rights, and men fare only slightly better — if they are lucky enough to be born into noble families, or pursue advancement within the clergy. The common folk, regardless of gender, endure harsh and unforgiving lives, yet remain fiercely devoted to the very institution that oppresses them. Generations of carefully crafted propaganda have turned this oppression into a form of national identity; disciplined, refined, orderly… and quietly suffocating.
As a result, Niamedia has become a land both feared and despised — isolated by choice and unwelcome even where it seeks entry. Contact with the rest of the Continent has been severely restricted since the Crimson Coup, leaving the Theocracy increasingly isolated and resentful. Many outside observers claim that the nation is already rotting from within, drowning in its own cynicism and vice, and that its collapse is only a matter of time.
Yet they have been predicting that downfall for nearly two centuries.
Religion & Church Organization
The original Niamedian religion, the one preceeding the existence of the Theocracy, spoke of two youthful deities, the Sun and the Moon. The Sun, in legends, was a powerful god, but held an insignificant role in the pantheon, and the Moon was the youngest and most beautiful among the Stars, who ruled the heavens with strict authority.
According to legend, the Moon saw the Sun one dawn and instantly fell in love — and the Sun loved her in return. Their bond, however, was forbidden by the Stars, who divided the day in two to keep them apart. From time to time the Moon would slip away to meet the Sun, and the Stars punished her whenever they discovered her defiance. These punishments became the explanation for the Moon’s phases and for those rare moments when both the sun and the moon appear together in the sky.
In his sorrow, the Sun created small mortal creatures and placed them upon the garden of Earth, which the Moon cultivated. She crafted animals of her own — both warm- and cold-blooded — and the two deities began to trade their creations in secret. Eventually, seeking a way to comfort her from afar, the Sun shaped beings capable of singing her praises: the first men. The Moon answered by gifting him similar beings, the first women. These were the Old Ancestors of humanity.
Every so often, in moments of great passion, the lovers would spill fragments of their immortal essence into their creations. These rare accidents produced mortals with powerful abilities; dendromancers, infused with the Sun’s life-giving force (predominantly male), and necromancers, touched by the Moon’s deeper, darker mysteries (almost always female).
Thus magic was understood as a divine inheritance, a byproduct of the gods’ longing for each other.
After the Crimson Coup, the Church put forward many reforms to secure its power and suppress dangerous magic-wielders. The Old Faith was reshaped into Niamedian Dualism, a doctrine proclaiming the Sun as the sole divine lord and savior of the nation, while the Moon was recast not as a lover, but as a dangerous and corrupting influence.
In Dualist teachings, the Sun represents purity, order, authority, and masculine virtue. The Moon, on the other hand, symbolizes temptation, rebellion, and the “dark” feminine.
Female necromancers — once regarded as living proof of the Moon’s blessing — became objects of fear, reviled as heretical and tainted. Their existence was used to justify the Church’s relentless persecutions.
Followers of the Old Faith still exist but are few, secretive, and gravely endangered. Anyone caught practicing the old rites is branded a dangerous heretic.
Under Church Law, sins such as heresy, homosexuality, incest, murder, and prostitution are strictly forbidden. In practice, the system is riddled with corruption; a well-placed bribe often erases a crime, especially when committed by nobles or clergy.
Priests, considered “pure vessels of the Sun,” are effectively above the law. Many indulge freely in the very acts they condemn — protected not only by their position, but by a theological doctrine claiming that sin cannot stain the Sun’s appointed servants.
The result is a society defined by deep hypocrisy — rigid moral codes for the common folk and lavish indulgence for the clergy.
- The High Priest - Shepherd of the Sun
- Absolute spiritual and political authority; essentially a dictator.
- Oversees the entire Theocracy.
- Head of the Council; final judge when it comes to doctrine, law, and magical regulation.
- The Council - Consists of five high-ranking priests who were originally priests assigned to each of the five ruling kings. After the Crimson Coup, they essentially became the nation’s rulers. Each oversees a major domain:
- High Priest of Doctrine – controls scripture, dogma, and religious education.
- High Priest of Judgment – oversees the interpretation and enforcement of Church Law.
- High Priest of Purification – handles necromancer hunts, magical trials, and heresy.
- High Priest of the Hearth – manages taxation and the Church’s vast wealth.
- High Priest of Illumination – controls propaganda, public ceremonies, and censorship.
- Their power is immense and largely unchecked.
