I make no claims of ownership over any intellectual property from this story, including, but not limited to, The Vision of Esacaflowne
Fanelia, such a small country and yet it has such a rich history. An obscure nation, nestled in the mountains far away from the major nations, and yet an important nation in the wars that frequently engulf Gaea. This nation has seen much hardship and has always managed to survive in the end.
Where to begin? Well, like all nations on Gaea its history can be traced back to the very founding Gaea by the Atlantians and the rule of the Draconians. Of course the Draconian rule of Gaea could not last and the world splintered into many nations, most of which ended up being ruled by various human factions that fought each other in a world that regularly saw empires rise and fall. One of these empires that emerged later was Drazonia. Drazonia itself had a long rich history and at the height of its power held sway over large portions of Gaea. One of these places ruled by Drazonia was an obscure, remote province, Sheen, ruled by the Duke Fanel. This province, while rather obscure was still moderately well off and that wealth allowed Sheen to maintain relative independence from the Drazonian capital, an independence that lasted so long as the Duke Fanel paid their taxes to the Drazonian capital. This relative independence allowed Sheen to maintain its own army and bureaucracy, of course nominally under the command of the main Drazonian army and bureaucracy.
But, the unity of Drazonia slowly crumpled and many provinces fell as nations, new and old, slowly gobbled up the splintering remnants of the once mighty Drazonian Empire. However, the independence that Sheen province maintained ultimately allowed the province to brace against the storm that swept the Drazonian empire and hold out against the forces that swept across the rest of the empire, as the main Drazonian army and bureaucracy crumbled. Nevertheless, the Duke Fanel stayed loyal to Drazonia, a loyalty that was maintained even when the Drazonian capital fell in the year 4576 AD (After Draconian). In return for the loyalty that Sheen showed Drazonia the last Drazonian emperor left instructions gifting the greatest treasure of his empire, the mightiest guymelef remaining in the world, the last of the great Ispano guymelefs: Escaflowne. He also granted Sheen its independence before taking his own life formally ending one of mightiest empires Gaea had ever seen fell. And so Escaflowne was passed on from the emperors of Drazonia to the kings of what is now known as Fanelia, no longer a province, now a true kingdom of its own.
This new kingdom had a great many problems, not the least of which was the severing of trade links caused by the fall of the Drazonian Empire. These trade links would not be built up again for a quite some time and this put many of the merchants in Fanelia out of business and caused a generally economic crisis that shook the former province. However, a more immediate problem was the dragons that moved in. These dragons didn't attack the city itself, they seemed to concentrate on the outlying farms and burned many to the ground. This attack on farms hit its peak in the year 4581 when so many farms were burned that the price of grain tripled and many people went into debt just to feed their families. The message from the dragons was clear: "move out, we don't want to kill you, but this is our land now". However the only recently crowned King Gergia Fanel couldn't let this happen, his land had seen to much hardship to give in now and he went out and met the next dragon attacking a farm. In his rage Gergia slew the dragon with only his sword. After this the dragons seemed to give up on ridding the humans from the land and left the humans alone. However, each new king of Fanelia from that time on rode out alone to slay dragon to remind the dragons what humans were capable of. A message was to eventually become a simple custom as the original meaning was lost.
One of the first great challenges that the new country had to deal with was the expansion of a new empire that threatened to gobble up the tiny Fanelia. Since Fanelia was at an obscure location it had been able to avoid many of the various wars that had broken out across Gaea after the fall of Drazonia, but Fanelia could enjoy peace in perpetuity and in the year 4612 the new Broderian Empire attacked Fanelia.
The war started when the Broderian king consolidated its rule over several other kingdoms by using a combination of untested succession laws, skillful diplomacy, cash gifts, and finally brute force. With the power of so many kingdoms the Broderian king moved against Fanelia having heard of its reputation for wealth from Fanelia's days as the Drazonian province of Sheen and assembled a large army to subdue Fanelia. This army was first noted when messengers from one of the kingdoms subdued by Broderia sent news of Broderia's plans to the Fanelian court detailing Broderia's plans.
With Broderia's plans known the second King Fanel (Tenta) moved his army into the best position that he could find: a mountain pass that the Broderian armies would have to pass through to get the main Fanelian settlements. Skillfully positioning his army in a defensive posture the King Fanel waited for the Broderian force to arrive.
When the Broderian army did arrive they saw the small army the Fanelian king had managed to assemble: only a half dozen guymelefs and 879 men while his own army had thousands of men and 37 guymelefs and, in his arrogance, attacked the main Fanelian line front on launching his men into an almost suicidal assault against a well entrenched army. The attack was thrown back in large part due the Fanelian king using the mighty guymelef Escaflowne. However, despite the bravery of the Fanelian army (their families very lives depended on their victory) and their king's mighty guymelef, defeat in end was inevitable and the Broderian forces gradually weakened the Fanelian line. After 5 assaults the Broderian king geared up for one last final attack that would surely break the Fanelian line. The attack came and King Tenta ordered his remaining men to hold out to the end. By this point Fanelian army was now reduced to 2 guymelefs (including Escaflowne) and just under 200 men capable of fighting. Then what can only be described as a miracle happened, several dozen dragons suddenly attacked the Broderian rear and threw the Broderian army into complete disarray killing hundreds of Broderian solders as King Tenta ordered his few remaining men out of the trenches and into an offensive. The Broderian army suddenly found itself attacked from two sides, one by dragons and the newly reenergized Fanelian army on the other. Although both sides of the offensive were weak in numbers the complete chaos the dragons created meant that organized resistance was impossible. The Broderian king didn't get where he was by being a fool and seeing that defeat had come he sounded the retreat and pulled his army back. King Fanel, seeing his own army also badly beat up decided not to pursue and pulled his own army back from the battlefield.
The battle itself ended with around half of the Broderian guymelefs destroyed and many of the rest in a state of disrepair. In addition much of army was now dead or injured. In the aftermath of the defeat much of the fear that the Broderian king had used to hold his power was shaken and most of his kingdom was now in outright rebellion. Thus he was forced to abandon all notions of taking Fanelia and was forced to deploy his army to put down the numerous rebellions that had broken out. The Broderian kingdom did manage to partially weather the storm, but with much of kingdom had successfully succeeded and its power was now significantly reduced.
Why the dragons attacked the Broderian army will forever remain a mystery, but the attack saved the Fanelian army from total defeat and allowed the Fanelian kingdom to endure. The Great Attack of the Dragons, as the incident was to be remembered as, gave Fanelia a reputation as a nation protected by dragons and nestled away in a position of near invulnerability. This reputation would serve the kingdom well in years ahead as more then one would be conqueror shied away from adding Fanelia to his empire for fear of meeting the same fate the Broderian kingdom had.
Using this reputation the Fanelian kingdom worked to expand their trade network and slowly set up a system by which their merchants moved throughout much of Gaea building the wealth of the young kingdom. This trade network made many men from many kingdoms extremely wealthy among these was a merchant family who owed much to the success of Fanelia, the Fassas. The Fassas were able to build up their wealth and gained much influence in the country of Austuria. They never forgot what they owed Fanelia and repaid that debt much later by one of the descendants of the Fassa family, Dryden.
The revival of trade links was only temporary. As more and more of the trade networks started being taken over by other kingdoms and wealthy families, the Fanelian kingdom gradually lost control of economic system it had worked so hard to build up. By the mid 4700's the Fanelian kingdom had become obsolete in the new trade network that had developed. It was just too far out of the way. However, by this point the Fanelian kingdom was essentially self-reliant. The money made from decades of lucrative trade had lead to the creation of entirely new towns throughout Fanelia's territory and a well equipped army.
However, the end the wealth that the trade had created came at a price, the decline in the quality of the military as subsequent kings cut funds from the military in order to maintain the luxurious lifestyle they had learned to enjoy during the time wealth in the late 4600's and early 4700's when the wealth of the world flowed to Fanelia. This caused unrest in the military establishment. As funding continued to drop and morale declined drastic action by the military gradually became pretty well inevitable. This lead to the first and only military coup in the history of Fanelia in the year 4787.
To understand just why this coup had such peculiar results one must note who the royal family was at the time. The previous king had two sons, the elder of whom (Rechir) completed the Right of Dragonslaying and became king upon his father's death. He was much like the kings before him, lived in well beyond his means while the kingdom lived in poverty. The younger son (Rak), while not officially part of the military, was extremely friendly with the high ranking members of the military and trained with the army.
It started with another round of budget cuts for the military. However, unlike other budget cuts this one would effectively remove any ability the military had to mount any sort of major offensive making the army purely defensive. The military couldn't allow this and started a plot a takeover of the Fanelia in support of the Rak using manufactured evidence that the Rechir's Right of Dragonslaying was faked. However, the younger son wasn't actually informed of this with the military leader gambling that once coup was finished the younger son would be forgiving, support his friends in the military, and take over as king.
On the day of the coup it started as planned, producing manufactured evidence that King Rechir's Right of Dragonslaying was faked. Afterwards they went, backed up with loyal army units, to arrest him. However, upon arriving at the palace they found that many of the army units had refused to back the military leaders, not enough to actually stop the coup but enough make a decent fight. After the military defeated the those trying to stop the coup the they King Rechir was killed..
Rak had managed to stay completely out of the loop of the those who had planned and carried out the coup and only found out about when the coup actually started and stayed out of the way until it was over. Rak was now being offered the crown by those who had just killed his brother in his name. Faced with a difficult dilemma he decided to complete the Right of Dragonslaying the same day and become king. After doing this he, as his first act as king, executed the lead conspirators in the coup and incorporated the military directly under his command. This removed the ability of the military to act independently of the king in the future. Rak also increased the budget of the military allowing it to act as an offensive force again.
The public's response to the whole affair was, at first, mostly one of bewilderment. Suddenly being told that the elder son wasn't legally king and that he deserved to die for it was quite a pill to swallow. After the coup was completed the public was more than ready to rebel against the younger son, however the execution the military leaders managed to placate the populous. Nevertheless, Rak had to be extremely careful with what he did for the remainder of his time as king.
The king who came to power via a coup went on to create a line of warrior kings. Kings who, almost by tradition, spent their teens training with the military developing that led to kings were felt a closer bond with the military than with common people. This created an era in Fanelian history starting in the middle of the 49th century when the kingdom started to become increasingly militaristic and expansionistic. As a result of this the Fanelian kingdom started to expand beyond its traditional borders well beyond what was established when it was a province of the Drazonian Empire.
The expansions were relatively harmless at first. Fanelia would take under occupied areas around Fanelia and populate them with settlers from the increasingly overcrowded Fanelian capital and surrounding cities. However, this form of expansion led to increasing borders that were increasing difficult to protect. While actual wars were rare in this relatively peaceful period, dragon attacks on the outskirts were still an occasional feature around this time and there were always small bands of independent raiders that made their livelihood attacking isolated villages and unescorted caravans. The villages themselves prospered as the need for more crops and raw minerals was always present in the Fanelian heartland and for export to other countries. However, the real profit from these towns came from several gold mines discovered just north of Fanelia's traditional borders. However, most of the money from these new towns and mines was fed directly into the expansion of the military, well beyond what was really needed to defend these new settlements.
With the kingdom becoming flushed with money they wanted to really expand. Or the king and his allies in the military did, the population was, broadly speaking, never particularly keen on this whole endeavor. With a agreement of his political allies in military the latest king finally started plotting real expansion. It started by taking small, traditionally independent villages that can exist in such a relatively isolated area. One by one these villages, which had long enjoyed their traditional independence from any outside control were taken over one by one by the Fanelian military and were placed under occupation with heavy taxes placed on them, taxes that flowed directly back to the Fanelian capital allowing the Fanelian military to expand even farther. All told 27 villages of various sizes were taken in this manner before other kingdoms started to notice. These 27 villages along with the area already colonized amounted an area twice the size of the traditional Fanelian kingdom with a population one fourth the size of the Fanelian kingdom, half of them being settlers from Fanelia proper
The problem started with the 28th village taken by the Fanelian army in the year 4887. Not that the population put up any real fight, rather that it was a larger village. A city really, perhaps the only such traditionally independent village that could really be called one. With its relatively large size it was able to gain some noteworthiness on the international stage and had defense pacts with several reasonably powerful nations. These treaties were immediately called into effect, something that the other kingdoms were hesitant to do and in the end only agreed to because they were beginning to fear the Fanelian kingdom. Now the arrogant Fanelian king suddenly found himself on the verge of a war that were it were it was quite possible he could not win. He could have backed out at this point simply by withdrawing from his latest conquest and making reparations. However, he could not bring himself even to do this. Thus the Fanelian army was thrown into a war with its military occupying hostile territory and engaged far away from its central base of operations. However, moral was high among the military. It had not fought a real war in a long time and was itching for a fight. Something the king was willing to give them.
The first battle of this war took place in the recently occupied city. Three armies from three separate nations converged on the occupying troops. The local army consisted of only enough men to collect taxes and prevent rebellions. Thus there were only 10 guymelefs and 700 men now attacked by a combined army of well over 5,000 men equipped with 120 guymelefs. Fighting took place inside the village itself as the Fanelian army fought a war of attrition. They fought for each building, each shop, and each street all of which turned into a bloodbath as civilians of military age were rushed into combat by both sides. However, the carnage was devastating as both sides showed themselves to be more than willing to destroy buildings to kill any solders that were inside. The training and equipment of the Fanelian solders proved itself an effective expenditure as they capable of fighting effectively when outnumbered and the Fanelian guymelefs were taking out at least two enemy guymelefs for every one of their own taken out. In end the however, the sheer number of the enemy forces proved to be more than enough to win the battle. However, the long term effect of this battle on the town proved to be unfortunate as many people died and most of the infrastructure of the town was destroyed as well.
This tale of war and carnage was repeated numerous times as the outnumbered Fanelian army fought for each town and each outpost with almost fanatical devotion. Meanwhile, raids taking place on stragglers and supply lines by Fanelians operating behind enemy lines had the effect of reducing moral and cutting the ability of allied forces to really push hard at Fanelia.
As the allied forces pushed into Fanelia proper worries about dragon attacks on them like the last army that tried to take on Fanelia directly forced the allied nations to devote troops to making sure the dragons stayed well away. Meanwhile Fanelia was preparing its defenses. Several defensive lines were already being made and the Fanelian guymelef reserves were now being called up. This would be a fight that would be fought right into and through the Fanelian capital itself.
After several months of rooting out Fanelian troops operating behind the lines and calling in reinforcements the main attack on Fanelian proper was now ready. The first few defensive lines set up by Fanelian forces fell quickly and with few casualties on both sides, they were mostly an effort to slow the allied armies down. However first the real fight came just outside a important Fanelian city, a city with the one of the largest populations in Fanelia.
The Fanelian king was not an idiot, he evacuated the civilians and turned the city into a giant fortress where almost street corner could turn an ambush point and any house could contain a weapons stash. The old stone wall surrounding the town was repaired and had watchtowers set up along it. The whole town became a deathtrap for any attacking army.
However, the alliance commanders were not stupid either. They realized that Fanelian army had set up effective defensives in the city proper and opted for a strategy that they felt would produce the fewest casualties and still take the city. They would attack a weak point and move in to destroy the grain silos then fall back and wait for the Fanelian army to surrender since they had lost their food supply.
The attack did not turn out as planned, the casualties were much higher than expected and were much higher for the attacking allies than for the Fanelian army. Also it later turned out that there were more grain silos then initially realized and the Fanelian army still had the bulk of their supplies left (over three years worth). So both sides went into full siege mode. The main Fanelian lacked the ability to break the siege and the Allies could not pierce the defense lines that the Fanelian army had built up.
However, during this time the social situation in Fanelia had was almost a breaking point. Almost all young men were in uniform and the rest of society had to deal with the fact while in a war that even the king and the top generals were starting to admit could not be won. The siege in progress was holding out but could not last forever and after it fell it would only be matter of time before the capital itself would find itself in a similar situation. So far full scale rebellion had yet to break out, but riots in the capital were starting to reach an almost unbearable level.
During this time a mysterious man suddenly appeared. He wore strange clothing, and spoke in an accent that no one had ever heard before. According to farther rumor he just fell from the sky, when no hoverships were in the area. Of course much of what surrounds the man will almost certainly forever remain a mystery forever, after all many even claim he came from the Mystic Moon.
When this man came down the first thing he was recorded to do was to head toward a small farming town where he was promptly arrested by the squad of solders, for reasons that will remain a mystery. Later at a local jail (really just a shed behind a farmhouse) he was reported to have broken the lock that was supposed to have held him. No one is really quite certain how he broke out. The most likely explanation is that he simply picked the locks, however many see this as proof of his magical powers.
After leaving the jail records do not show what he did for some period of time. What is known is that four months later he appeared in the Fanelian capital. When there got to the capital a solder who was part of the squad who had originally arrested him back in that small town and took him before the king. Once there the man spoke of ideals of a society of free of war and hate. The king was said to have broke down in tears, for the first time in his life and the whole room broke down and there was now to no question that peace negotiations were to begin.
In a few weeks peace negotiations were started and lasted several months. In the end the treaty was agreed and forced Fanelia to do several things. First was to restore independence to all independent towns conquered by the Fanelian army. Second was to grant independence to several areas of Fanelia that had long desired it, all told about 1/5 of Fanelia was granted independence in four separate parts. These newly independent areas were created in such a way as to ensure that they would never be a military threat to Fanelia. These new kingdoms would spend the next couple of decades just beating each other up as age old hostilities could finally be expressed in open warfare. Finally the last clause stated that the king who had veered his country to war would step down and yield the thrown to a relative of his who was not overly influenced by the military. A great nephew of the king was found who and he assumed the thrown after completing the Rite of Dragonslaying.
The new king reduced the size of the military and exiled several of the leading generals. With this reduction he was able to reduce the tax burden on the populace leading to a period of economic growth and prosperity and the country began to recover from the devastation the war had caused.