Kingdom of Bal

http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/291/balflagsw1.jpg

Land

After the fall of Bal Castle, the Kingdom of Bal lost control over the Balsan Continent on Merge World II. All that remained of Bal's territory was on the Kuzar Continent to the East. Though Bal still lays a claim to Balsan (which includes both Bal proper and the former province of Quelb in the North), in reality it does not control this landmass any longer.

Additionally, Bal is an official partner in running the Gatian colonies on Merge III and Merge IV. Bal is the only native Merge Dimension power with any kind of a space presence -- albeit a tenuous and weak one. In recent memory the only use that Bal's spacefleet saw was in evacuating the Balian population from southern Balsan to Kuzar as the Quelban insurrectionists gained ground.

Population

The population of Bal is primarily human, though moogles also dwell in its lands. Minority populations of Goblins and related races are also to be found, living mostly tribal lives in and around the city of Rugoru in the Kuzar province. Members of these races are allowed to pass freely throughout the Kingdom.

One should note that not all Quelban werewolves were a party to Vodon's rebellion. Many wolves fled with the Balians to Kuzar, and make up a slight minority of the Kingdom's current racial makeup.

Religion

Bal is a secular state, though ancestor worship is prevalent in the human and werewolf cultures. However, one religion has grown out of Bal and become prevalent throughout the Kingdom in the time since the passing of ExDeath. The deity Thumancar has adopted Bal and become the Kingdom's patron, and so his religion, Thumancara, has become embedded into Bal.

Thumancara would not have become so widespread without the late Queen Kururu's endorsement. She worshipped Thumancar, it is said, because Thumancar is in fact an ascended deification of the slain Balian King Galuf Galgadon, who was the Queen's grandfather.

Thumancar is a deity of wisdom and leadership. His religion is centered around a philosophy that is very much in keeping with Bal's older traditions of ancestor worship. Thumancar teaches that the dead watch over and advise their descendents as they progress through life, and it is the knowledge of those who have come before that those alive now must rely upon in order to attain fulfillment. It is in this way that Galuf, as Thumancar, once watched over his granddaughter the Queen, and now his great-grandson Calleis -- and by extension the Kingdom of Bal itself.

The current leader of Thumancara is the High Priest Falkos Tonders Thumancara I, who was Thumancar's First Prophet and the founder of the religion. Much like Rainere in Tasnica, Thumancar has been relatively quickly adopted by Bal and incorporated into the nation's culture. Likewise, Thumancar's prophet has been relatively quickly enshrined as an individual of great importance; though he is less vocal and less visible in Bal, there are some who suggest that his will is nearly as important as the King's.

The Moogles and the Werewolves do not practice Thumancara per se; shrines were set up in the Quelban woods and in the Moogle woods of Kuzar, but an insignificant population of either race has ever actively practiced what is for the most part a human Balian religion. In fact, during the insurgency in Quelb, Thumancaran shrines became targets of Vodon's werewolves, who saw the religion as a symbol of the Kingdom they were trying to destroy.

Economy

Bal's economy is is largely based on trade and relations with the Kingdom of Guardia. Bal is the major dispersal point in Merge for Gatian technology. Within Merge, Bal trades mostly with the Kingdoms of Surgate, Karnak and Worus.

Bal has always maintained a free market system, and does not have an extensive social safety net like big brother Guardia does. Bal's economy has taken a major hit since the fall of Bal castle. Effectively, Bal lost all its major metropolitan and industrial sectors when the Balsan continent was taken from them. Rapid modernization is occuring around Castle Kuzar and the city of Rugoru, but the Kingdom has no real hope of replacing what was lost without actually being able to re-take southern Balsan.

Law

Bal was once divided into three states, but they lost two of those states to Vodon's insurrection. The old Kingdom was a federation, where individual states were free to make and enact their own laws. Balian Royal Law often took precedence over the laws of the other states, but the specifics of state-versus-Royal laws was left to the decisions of the Tribunal of Bal, a judicial body that was comprised of five judges. Since the fall of Bal, many of the old organs of Government still are in place: the King and the Tribunal still exist, though the Tribunal no longer deals in conflicts between royal and state law (since the Kingdom now only comprises a single state). Generally speaking, Balian law falls on the side of individual liberty. Balians enjoy the right of due process, the freedom of speech and freedom of the presses and mass media (or what little vestiges of such things remain since the fall). The only thing Balians are denied is the right to vote: there is little to no democracy in Bal except at the civic level -- especially since the move to Kuzar, since it is customary (especially in Rugoru) to elect local leaders by way of a popular ballot.

Government

The King of Bal is the central authority in the whole Kingdom of Bal. His power overrules that of all other members of the Balian government, with the possible exception of the Tribunal.

Bal has a small group of four noble families, who governed the Four Counties of Bal before the fall of Balsan: Norsten, Salisten, Walsten and Egersten. The Counts and Countesses were mostly only responsible for overseeing the Kingdom's agriculture; prior to the fall, they had little to no actual political clout. Instead they were effective lobbyists for the agrarian concerns of the outlying Balian farming communities. Where most landed nobilities in the Web tend to form aristocracies, in point of fact the Counties of Bal proper actually functioned almost as a labor union -- for the families of the Counts and Countesses didn't just own the farmlands, they also worked them. The four families provided the Queen with the perspective of the peasants in her Kingdom, and served as intermediaries between the Queen and the working Balian farmer.

However, this changed after the exodus to Kuzar; after the insurrection, the Counts and Countesses of the Four Counties of Bal have risen to true political positions. Even though they no longer control their fiefs in Balsan, they have formed into a Council that would presume to legislate, which they could not have done if King Calleis had not given formal recognition to this Council. The Council's functions are supremely legislative. From among the four Counts on the Council, a Marquis is "elected." The Marquis, per Bal's post-insurrectionist constitution, has limited executive functions, but only so long as the King gives the Marquis his favor. The Marquis is really more of a chief bureaucrat than a national leader; his powers are those of oversight and execution only. He has no command over the army, little in the way of priveleges of position, and is almost always kept in check by the King.

Beneath the County Council is the Governing Council, which is a vestige of the old state government of Kuzar, and serves as a secondary legislative house. The Governing Council tends to break down along racial, rather than partisan lines: humans and goblinkin and moogles each struggle for their competing interests, which have only been compounded with the sudden influx of refugees from the Balsan continent. The Governing Council is re-evaluating its charter at present, and working towards electing from their number a strong leader to compete with the Marquis of the County Council for voice within the Royal Government.

Finally, we have the Tribunal of Bal, a council of five judges who serve as the supreme judicial entity of the Kingdom. The Tribunal is not exclusively human; two of the judges on the Tribunal are moogles, and one is a Quelban werewolf. By necessity, the Tribunal has supreme interpretive power over the Law in Bal, and only the Tribunal has the power to overturn a Royal Decree -- though the Tribunal may not generate laws or decrees on its own.

Internal Politics

Internal politics have changed dramatically since the fall of Bal Castle. Conflicts with local Kuzaran authorities are common, but widespread anti-Royal sentiment does not appear to be building. If anything, the remnants of the Kingdom of Bal have been galvanized behind their leaders and support them in their efforts to re-take what was lost during the insurrection.

Foreign Politics

Bal's primary foreign relations are with her three sister kingdoms: Surgate, Worus and Karnak. Bal has also maintained relations with Tycoon, even into post-Leviathan War exile. Bal was at one time friendly toward Lord Stantalias' government, who had made gestures toward improving relations between the Crowns and the Merge League, but the return of Alkar has seen such progress quickly curdle. Both native Balian and Guardian intelligence has learned that the Communist Protectorate had given aid and support to the Quelban insurgents, so the Balian government now holds the Merge League in contempt.

Bal fears the dwarves and Dack Stonescythe, and is thankful that his menace is not a thing of worry for her and her allies on World II. Outside Merge, Bal's strongest foreign relation is Guardia. Bal is often considered part of the "Guardian Hegemony." Still, troubling to most Balians is the noted lack of Guardian boots-on-the-ground in the wake of the rebellion in Quelb. The question seems to linger in the minds of those who barely managed to escape the onslaught of the Wolves of Vodon: "Where were our vaunted allies, the Guardians, in our time of need?"

Military

Bal's military has been built up since the war with Guardia, and is now one of the most modernized armed forces in the Fringe. Guardia's close sponsorship has turned Bal into a military contender in Merge: Guardian equipment, weapons and war machines are frequently found in Bal's ranks. This was done, at first, during the height of the OmniSent Crisis, but a revision and upgrade of Bal's military hardware was performed again after the close of the Leviathan War, when Alkar returned to power in the Merge League and there was cause to secure Bal's borders. Never in anyone's wildest dreams did the Guardians or the Balians imagine that a threat to the Kingdom would come first from within their own territory.

Bal's elite forces are comprised of Dragoons. Elite among the elites are the Hiryuu Clanners, a unique breed of Dragon Clanners trained by Bal's General Senso. Hiryuu Clanners are adept dragonriders, and also possess the transformative powers that the Dragon Clans are known for.

Bal has a limited space fleet, comprised of IJF vessel designs that have undergone some modifications by Guardian engineers. This fleet is largely mercantile, and serves Bal in transporting goods and personnel between Merge II and the colonies on Merge III and Merge IV. Some of these ships have fallen into the hands of pirates over the years, though Balian ships themselves rarely fall to the depredations of such buccaneers (everybody knows it's cargo from the Core that brings in the big bucks).