The Elden Concordat

The Elden Concordat was born not in triumph but in desperation. In the long twilight after the Severance, when storms of miracle and curse still ravaged the land, humanity lay scattered. Ruins festered, orcoid war-clans prowled the plains, and the dead did not always remain still. From the mountains came the goliath clans, themselves pressed from their high places by famine and bitter cold. Between them was only ruin, yet upon the broken stones of Caer Haleth they swore: stand together, or be broken alone.

Thus began the Concordat, not as kingdom or empire, but as pact. The first covenant bound men and goliaths in survival, and from that covenant a culture of oath and memory took root.

The Chain of Oath

The symbol of the Concordat is the chain. Each hold, township, or clan is a link. Alone, fragile. Together, unbroken. To swear the Chain is to bind one’s people to all others: to come when called, to give when asked, and to stand when others fall.

Every Concordant settlement displays the chain in its own way: carved over gates, forged into iron sigils, woven into banners, pressed into coins. Children are taught the maxim: a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. To betray the bond is not mere crime but treason against survival itself. Exiles are said to be “cast from the chain,” and few live long once unbound.

The Council at Caer Haleth

Caer Haleth, once a shattered fortress, became the anchor of the Chain. Its halls are rough, half stone and half timber, but within them gather representatives from every sworn freehold. They come as they are: goliath Shieldband leaders, village elders, mercenary captains, priests, and farmers alike. No crown dictates, no flame compels.

Debate is slow, quarrels fierce, and consensus hard-won. Yet once forged, a ruling of the Council is iron. To break from it is to shatter trust, and the Chain does not forgive broken links. Where Antioch punishes treason by law, the Concordat answers betrayal by neighbor’s blade.

Faith and Memory

The Concordat has no single creed, yet its people are deeply pious. Shrines rise to Serenna of the Grove, Thul of the Wet Pages, Ilvar the Judge, and many others besides. What unites them is memory: the belief that survival depends upon recalling debts, oaths, and sacrifices.

Every household keeps a Ledger of Bond, a record of promises given and fulfilled. These are brought forth at marriages, funerals, and trials, each name and deed recited to remind that life is woven of promises kept. Forgetfulness is peril. Betrayal is death. Memory is survival.

The Sword of the Chain

The Concordat has no standing army. Each freehold raises its own defenders, but when the Chain is pulled taut, they march together. To outsiders such forces seem irregular, a patchwork of militias, mercenary bands, and clan levies. Yet when bound by oath they fight with the ferocity of those who know no one else will come if they fail.

The goliath Shieldbands form the iron links. Each band preserves its name and deeds for generations, their scars carried like scripture. Human hosts vary more, some trained with soldier’s precision, others armed peasants bound only by promise. Yet once the Chain is sworn, they march as one.

Law and Justice

Law in Concordant lands begins local. Each freehold enforces its own codes. Yet the Council may intervene when oaths are broken or disputes threaten the greater bond. In such cases, arbiters are dispatched, their rulings inscribed into the Archive of Chains at Caer Haleth, where every oath and judgment is remembered.

The gravest crime is not theft, nor murder, but the sundering of oath. To fail one’s promise is to weaken the whole, and such failures are punished with exile, shunning, or execution. Justice in the Concordat is neither swift nor uniform, but it is binding, and it is remembered.

Life in the Concordat

To live under the Chain is to live bound to others. Villages may be crooked, their walls timber and stone scavenged from ruins, but each is woven into the wider whole. Markets bustle with goods from distant freeholds, carried by trust more than tribute. Outsiders may be welcomed, but only if they swear bond.

Architecture preserves what came before. Old stones are not erased but reused. New homes rise on broken walls. Shrines to multiple gods share the same square. Nothing is wasted if it can be carried forward.

Art exalts promise. Songs recount debts repaid and lives saved. Murals depict goliaths lifting humans onto their shoulders in flood, villages feeding one another in famine, chains linking across ruined bridges. Honor in the Concordat is not in conquest but in endurance, and endurance is measured in promises kept.

The Bond Endures

Thus stands the Elden Concordat. It is not empire, nor kingdom, nor church. It is oath, and it is chain. Slower than Antioch, less uniform, often quarrelsome. Yet when monsters rise, the links hold fast. When famine strikes, the links tighten. When walls fall, neighbors arrive.

The Concordat is no bastion of stone. It is a bond of iron, hammered link by link, carried through famine and storm. Empires may rise and fall, but so long as one link holds, the Chain will endure.