Drahkimar 1

I thought I'd do a post on some content set in the land of Drahkimar.Just get the content out there, even if the world itself isn't used for all that much.

Be warned, this is all old stuff from my childhood.  I've been building Drahkimar since I started writing (The Legend of Trazin is set in Drahkimar, albeit on the floating continent.

Today's topic is the boundaries of the Dominion.

Vakemia is probably the main setting at the heart of Drahkimar - all the surrounding lands, and the lands surrounding those, were originally answering the question of "what's over that direction?"

The Dominion 'borders' Vakemia on it's west.  It is about twice as large as Vakemia in size, shaped somewhat like a cross between a rectangle and an amoeba.  On the west half, the boundaries are pretty clear:  On the north there are the poisoned lands and the rot-iron mountains.  Unconquered due to it being blighted and mostly worthless.  On the south and southwest there is the Alterrian mountain range (though it continues to diminish the further it goes west, eventually just being foothills and nothing special), as well as the Jurungald.  The mountains are something of an annoyance, as see in the case of the kingdom of Alterria, but most of the border is due to the presence of the Jurungi.  As powerful as the Dominion is, they can barely fight a war on three fronts, let alone on four.

Directly west of west (the Dominion has been conquering west for quite some time), at the current boundaries, is Vakemia.  If you think of the Alterrian mountain range and the poisoned lands as north and south boundaries that both Vakemia and the Dominion share, then Vakemia is at the end of a long corridor, with the Dominion pressing onwards and inwards.  Vakemia proper is only on the west side of Mt. Keres, and the sweep of mountains north from there is what the Twelve Lords once considered the bounds of their territory (Mt. Keres is the highest peak of the Alterrian mountain range, massively triggered by the Apocalypse long, long ago). 

The Dominion has been pressing onwards continually, lead by the Children, and so a few decades ago they started to push around the north end of the Keres mountain range and entered into open war with the western kingdoms of present day Vakemia.  While the armies of the Dominion are one of the best martial fighting forces in Drahkimar, organized and well-trained, Vakemia presented a foe that they had never fought before.  All of the Dominion's other lands and neighbors are mundane, so they are not used to fighting a foe armed with both steel and magic, nor are they used to surviving in a magical land.  Moral is low, and their tactics are relatively ineffective.  This has not kept them from overwhelming several kingdoms, and causing one to retreat out of existence.  Shortly after the present day, a particular charismatic leader leads a revolt in the West Army(similar to legendary China, their are four armies after the four compass directions).

On the eastern side of the Dominion, less is known.  If one were to walk along the north boundary of the Dominion, the rot-iron mountains would be left behind, and later the poisoned lands would end as well.  Continuing onwards, you would eventually come across a rather large inland sea.  Between the poisoned lands and the water, there is near-constant fighting between the northern barbarians and the North Army.  Settlers from the Dominion have been colonizing further and further upwards, following the side of the sea north and then west and the North Army's role is largely to protect them from the more inland-based barbarians.

The sea is not all that wide, and the Dominion has started colonizing on the other side of the sea, crushing their demi-human cousins there.

Following the ocean south, the Dominion expands quite a distance south.  This is the southern thrust of the Dominion, and is, for once, at peace.  The southern thrust is borderned on the east by the inland sea.  The Dominion continues south until it reaches the same river that goes west to support the Northern (Desert) Kingdom.  On the other side of the river is the Southern Empire, and the two are at peace and enjoy a healthy amount of trade.  Following the river west from the inland sea brings you to increasing aridity and eventually the Desert.  Some hardy settlers have colonized westward, but there is decreasing appeal to the land the further west you go.  Following this very, very rough boundary north, it takes you to a smaller lake, where some of the rivers in the Dominion pool before going around south of the Alterria range and going west rather than east.  Going around the west of the lake would bring you into the Jurungald, so going around east keeps you in the Dominion, and links up to the southern boundary of the western Dominion.

And there you have it - the boundaries of the Dominion.

Of the bordering lands, the barbarians up north and the proto-humans to the east (other side of the big sea) were never fleshed out.  Well, I mean I know what the proto-humans are, since they figure in the history of the area, but I don't know how they are in this present day - the people in the area that I deal with are all what I refer to as humans.  (Except the Archipelago, which are Vi'nari by blood.)  (Actually except the Krt'kta, the elves, the elves, and the Jurungi, plus all of the Vakemia demi-races... but all the proto-humans have interbreed with other things.)