DauilandBoard

In the still-brutally cold early months of the year 305, the Excordiation was dealt a startling blow, its most ardent supporters now significantly more cautious in their commitment, its leaders beginning to exchange worried communications between each other, and its opposition hoping to resolve this entire matter quickly and decisively. Elector Noros IV Lyka had been diagnosed with the Plague of Dyras, a fearsome disease that had troubled the peninsula ever since it entered Unidalania three centuries ago through the maritime city-state of Dyras. The plague took little time to pass a victim, and it could not be passed between humans — it was only through contact with contaminated items that others received it — but what so worried the Excordiants about Noros’s reception of the plague was that, despite the accumulated knowledge of the medical societies, the Plague of Dyras was incurable.

In the days after Noros was diagnosed, he was either going to survive the plague relatively unharmed or die quickly yet excruciatingly. It was the unavoidable chance of death that worried both Cordians and Excordiants across the peninsula, as his successor — as determined by Lyka’s unique succession laws — would be Exollos Lyka: young, arrogant, impulsive, and worst of all, a fierce militarist.

Fortunately, Noros lived through the day during which as well as the day after which he was diagnosed with the plague, his body showing no signs of succumbing. The following day, feeling confident that he would survive, Noros dispatched messengers to his allies, Elector-Regent Mettsen of Syntiria and Elector Wesiros Arvenia, telling them to put their worries to rest and inviting them to convene at Lykum to consider the future of the Excordiant League.

Then, on the fourth day, the twenty-nine-year old elector of Lyka died to the Plague of Dyras. Mettsen and Wesiros hadn’t even received Noros’s dispatch when the Lykan government sent out another group of messengers, this time announcing the death of its ruler. Following tradition, before the inauguration of Exollos, the Lykan advisory council officially bestowed Noros IV the honorific “the Honest.” And during the crowning of Elector Exollos Lyka, she gave herself an honorific, breaking severely from the tradition of the advisory council granting one an honorific after one’s death. Lyka’s new leader was now Exollos the Undying.

—

So, instead of the Excordiation’s leaders meeting to contemplate their future, it was Emperor Ennisos VI Kattornika who held a convention in the cool spring of 305 to find allies. Despite all his capriciousness, Ennisos knew what the rise of Exollos meant for the Pentarchy: it was one step closer to war. If the other side of this ever-growing conflict was to attack Kattornika, Ennisos knew he could rely on Hyraxia, as his alliance with Hephloros III was the strongest in the peninsula, and on Praxia, for he held as much power there as he did in his homeland. But unlike past war or insurrection, much of the Electorate would not support the Emperor. Lyka and Syntiria, of course, wanted nothing to do with Kattornika, but now that Wesiros Arvenia supported their cause, the military strength of the Excordiant League more than matched that of his alliance.

So, for all his impulsive and erratic actions, Ennisos finally followed his council’s counsel and held a convention with Hyraxia to plan the creation of the Cordian League. Ennisos and Hephloros’s first day was spent planning and formalizing the first steps they would take if attacked by the Excordiant League. They then shifted to discussions regarding further diplomacy. Because Kattornika’s army was too elite and expensive to keep standing and Hyraxia’s navy was configured for trade in a manner that would take months to undo, the Excordiant League currently had a military strength frighteningly comparable to the Kattornikans’, not to mention the mobilization that was sure to come with Exollos ruling Lyka.

Ennisos’s first thought was to use the loyalty of the remaining elector, Erisia, at the time led by staunch Cordian Verisos II, to grow his league. Hephloros, while younger, was the more politically acute of the two, and suggested securing new alliances rather than further instituting existing ones.

For the next week, Ennisos and Hephloros — two of the most influential Kattornikas in the dynasty’s history — worked on a series of documents and plans that would not be revealed to the public — or almost anyone else, for that matter — for many months.

—

That day, the day after the end of 305’s winter festivals, the first day of the year 306, the Treaty of Cordian Solidarity was signed. The deliberations of Cordian Convention of 305 had eventually returned to Ennisos’s first thoughts, as Erisia joined the Cordian League. The treaty also brought two new countries into the league: Plesa, a Free City neighboring and heavily reliant on Kattornika, and Genetia, a small yet powerful Merchant Republic whose immense wealth and strong navy, Ennisos and Hephloros hoped, would deter the Excordiants from attacking. And if war was to erupt, neighboring Lyka owed Genetia several favors that would help sway the tide.

For now, though, almost all members of both the Cordian and Excordiant Leagues were hoping with all their will that the devastation and wrath of war would not descend upon them.

—

Then, in the waning days of 306, Exollos Lyka sent her most loyal operatives into the court of a Cordian nation. Their mission? Assassinate Verisos II, drawing enough attention to let Exollos quietly mobilize her army on the Genetian border.