The Tyrancy of Geddephron
Patron: Geddephron the Terrible (Unknown Dragon)
Capital: Cruciform
Primary Race: Half-Orc, Lizardfolk, Ogre, Orc
Primary Language: High Draconic
Suggested Traits: Bully, Fleet, Gambler, Hardy, Ignorance is Bliss, Quick Reaction, Sneaky, Street Smart, Strong Soul, Work Hard, Where it Hurts
Regional Feat: Bloody but Unbroken
Description
Little is truly known about the inner workings of the so-called Tyrancy, ruled by the great dragon Geddephron the Terrible. Though hyperbolic rumors claim it is a land of murder, chaos, and debauchery, the few reliable stories indicate that it is actually a rigid meritocracy guided by the hand of Geddephron and administered by his so-called Gravelords, Graveknights who rule from burnt-out citadels and battle mounted upon red or magma dragons.
Though it is populated mostly by lizardfolk and orcs, there are small tribes of ogres bred into brutal conditions and severed from their ancestral practices, turning them into monstrous brutes that live only to serve their master. Undead also see heavy usage in the Tyrancy and most citizens can look forward to having their corpses raised to work in mines or fields or else man walls around the factory-cities where the living toil day and night to produce the mysterious products that Geddephron demands.
Ruled by sheer power, with no imports or exports and no mortal nobility to placate, the entirety of the Tyrancy's power is turned towards Geddephron's will. That no one seems to know what that will is directed towards is the most terrifying fact of all.
History
Around the dawn of the seventh millennium, several volcanoes along the ridge of the East Delka Mountains erupted with vigor unusual even for the tectonically unstable Zenáthras. Several small orcish villages that huddled in the mountains' shadow prayed fervently to Iskosk, the noble salamander who served as their patron. What they found the next morning, beneath the soot-stained sky, was Iskosk's beheaded corpse crucified in the square of the largest village. In each village stood a tall figure entirely in black, charred armor that informed them that they were now servants of Geddephron, the master of the volcanos beneath which they lived.
The rest is history, with waves of these Graveknights radiating out, slaying the minor patrons of small villages and forcing the inhabitants to worship Geddephron instead or have their homes burned to the ground and their children taken away to more tractable settlements. When the expansion reached its current size, no more knights were sent and focus was shifted from conquest to construction. The villages were consolidated into larger, more easily-defensible cities which were devoted entirely to manufacturing, with great foundries in which all citizens toiled, fed by mines and farmland worked by disposable undead. Little concern was paid to defense beyond the immediate concerns of monster attacks and that proved a weakness in Millennium 7 Year 320, when the Council of Wyrms launched a war to liberate the enslaved citizens.
Though the Gravelords and the dragons attempted to fight back, they were crushed by the superior teamwork and training of the Council's Knights Draconis. Indeed, the Council pushed all the way to the fortified capital of Cruciform, where Geddephron itself had to emerged from the volcanoes in which it seemed to live and crush the Council's forces, reclaiming its land for the Tyrancy before returning to whatever dark designs have occupied it for the last few centuries.
Since that time, however, it has been noted that the Gravelords and their vassal Graveknights have been training relentlessly in tactics while on dragonback, doubtless hoping to find the secrets that made the Knights Draconis so potent in the skies of battle.
Foreign Relations
The Tyrancy cares nothing for its neighbors. When it was first formed, it expanded rapidly and without any appreciable resistance, but when it reached its current size, it simply stopped growing and has contented itself with ignoring all outsiders. Only during the Volcannon War did a foreign power try to wrest control of its lands away, and they were finally turned aside by Geddephron's personal power.