All magic is strictly monitored within the borders of the Empire. Spellcasters can only learn certain types of approved magic at government run schools. Those with inherit magical capabilities are placed on registries and prevented from using magic except at pre-approved locations and times. Magical gems known as Keystones are distributed by the Empire’s government to local leaders to allow for the casting of approved spells to benefit the towns and cities by those not trained in magic. (Think of it like a magical welfare system). Some view this level of control as tyrannical and reprehensible, while others belief the harsh laws and support from the government have only made life better. However, the Empire is still somewhat reeling from a recent failed attempt to annex Marseille.
Emperor Endymion, the Magistus
The Empire is ruled from the Citadel by Emperor Endymion — revealed in Session 7 to be one of the Magistus, the spellcasters who stopped the Great Cataclysm, and the only Magistus known to still be alive. He is currently marching an army to unify the continent, and is considered possibly the most powerful spellcaster in the world — which is why no one dares ask questions about the Magistus, or about how the green fourth magic now powers his Empire from the Citadel.
Notably, Pentamarone — founded by another Magistus, Rellyona — sits inside the Empire’s borders yet outside its jurisdiction. Whether that reflects a falling-out among the Magistus or an old truce between Rellyona and the Emperor is exactly what the party can’t yet determine (see Pentamarone for the three competing rumors). (Session 12: Madame Verre’s account, via Genni, is the truce — the two parted with deep mutual respect, and the Emperor has never encroached on the city to honor Rellyona’s legacy.)
Session 10 — First Sighting on the Ground (August 26, 2026)
The Fallen were dumped by a misfired teleport into Empire woodland north of Pentamarone and got their first look at the Empire’s forces in the field.
- The banner: a sword crossed with an axe. Asha identified it; nobody else at the table recognized it.
- A column marching south from the north, roughly 30–45 minutes’ march behind the party — and then, at a crossroads, it split east and west and stopped heading south entirely. Leif read the maneuver as a pincer. Around what is unknown.
- Pentamarone’s residents were unbothered: routine patrols, they say, which “know not to get close to the city.”
- Confirmed by a trader at the docks: outside a sanctioned town’s borders, being caught casting unauthorized magic without keystone authority means the army makes it your problem.
- Unsettling detail from inside Pentamarone: the safe in Genni’s study and Genni’s own staff both bear the symbol of the magic the Empire uses. The benign reading is guild-held keystones; the other reading is that the Empire’s reach inside the “free” city is further than advertised.
Session 12 — Religion, Resistance, and the Cataclysm’s Origin (September 23, 2026)
- The Empire enforces worship of Mars, the Agent of Force — found by Aren in the Temple of Venus library. Neighboring Pentamarone worships Venus. The two powers have two different patron Agents.
- Organized resistance exists. The adventurers who cornered Aleister in Pentamarone call themselves The Sundered Watch (name as heard — unconfirmed): “a group of resistance fighters against the Endymion Empire. So we kind of go from town to town.” They first met Aleister in a town far to the north, and lost two friends in undead-infested ruins there.
- The Great Cataclysm began here. Per Madame Verre, it started in the northern mountain range of what is now the Endymion Empire and travelled southeast across Astrodia — matching the green line on Simone’s map. She also let slip that the Cataclysm was a portal to another world, and that the Magistus sealed the rift. (She didn’t say which of them; the Emperor is one of the Magistus.)
- Genni’s account of the truce — see above and Pentamarone.