The Five Kingdoms: From Peace to Gunpowder
There was once an age remembered as the Sweet Years, when the Five Kingdoms of Iron, Atira, Naryan, Aria, and Lariance lived in peace. It is said that during this time, a traveler could walk the length of the continent without ever being asked his name, his homeland, or his purpose. The borders of kingdoms were no more than markers on a map. The road that bound them together was called the Free Road, and upon it passed farmers with grain, merchants with silver, priests with scrolls, and children who followed caravans for the joy of hearing foreign songs.
At the heart of this harmony stood the Iron Kingdom. Its king, a man of quiet voice and weary eyes, was unlike the rulers before him. He waged no wars, claimed no lands, and sought no crown beyond his own. "A king who fights leaves scars," he once told his council. "A king who waits leaves roots. And roots feed generations." These words spread farther than any decree. They became a proverb on every road, quoted by merchants, whispered by mothers, even sung by children at play.
The other kings respected him. The King of Aria once jested, "Iron wins wars without drawing swords because it never fights them." In Atira, merchants laughed that the Iron King must be lazy, yet they praised him in the same breath, for his restraint meant their wagons could pass untroubled. Even the shadowed lords of Lariance admitted, grudgingly, that his silence kept their rivers calm. And in Naryan, where ships sailed the seas unhindered, sailors said the waves themselves had grown gentler beneath his reign.
So it was for a generation: thirty years of quietness, when the kingdoms prospered together. But peace is a fragile crown, and ambition is the shadow that waits beneath it.
The first cracks were whispers.
In Atira, the merchants who had grown rich on grain wagons began to mutter that the world depended on them. "Without us, they would starve," they boasted in wine halls. "Should not the hand that feeds be the hand that rules?" They did not yet call for war, but the seed of pride was planted.
In Naryan, admirals gazed upon the sea and grew bitter. Their wooden fleets had long been unmatched, their harbors the gateways of the world. Yet under the peace of the Iron King, ships of every flag passed without tribute. "Once they bent knee to our sails," said one admiral. "Now they sail as if we are ferrymen." Pride curdled into resentment.
In Aria, whose kings prized law above all, the blade of justice grew too sharp. They denounced corruption in neighboring lands, sending letters and proclamations that humiliated noble houses before their people. "We are guardians of truth," Aria's king declared, yet his neighbors heard only accusation and arrogance.
And in the forested rivers of Lariance, the lords smiled their thin smiles. They drew no swords, but they wove threads of distrust. Daughters were married into foreign thrones. Coins were slipped to rebels. Words were whispered into the ears of kings. Theirs was the art of quiet poison, and they practiced it well.
The Iron King saw all this and held his silence. But where once his silence had been trusted as wisdom, now it was mistaken for weakness. "He sleeps," muttered the King of Atira. "Or worse he waits for us to turn our backs."
The Free Road still wound across the land, but laughter was quieter upon it. Merchants now carried daggers beneath their cloaks. And in taverns, men spoke of war not as a memory, but as a storm that might soon come again.
The storm broke with fire on the sea.
One morning, a fishing village on the Narrow Sea awoke to thunder. At first they thought it was a storm, but the sky was clear. Then from the mist emerged a shape no eye had ever seen. It was a ship, yet it bore neither sails nor oars. Its hull was of steel, black and gleaming, and its engines roared like some great beast.
From its decks fell iron canisters. They split the air with shrieks and shattered the village in flame. Roofs collapsed, bodies were torn apart, and the sea turned red with blood. The survivors swore that the ship moved as though it thought, that its engines pulsed like lungs. They called it a ship of fire and mind.
When word spread, the kingdoms reeled.
Atira accused Naryan who else could command the sea?
Naryan accused Atira who else had the wealth to build such a monster?
Aria demanded justice, calling for all kingdoms to stand trial.
Lariance whispered suspicion into every ear, weaving fear like a net.
And Iron… Iron kept its silence.
The Five Kings gathered in council, but their words were poisoned.
"This was your doing!" roared the King of Atira.
"Lies! You dare blame us, grain-seller?" shouted Naryan's admiral-king.
"If neither confesses, both must be punished," declared Aria's stern monarch.
"Or perhaps," the Lord of Lariance said with his thin smile, "we punish all, and crown the survivor."
The Iron King raised his frail hand. His voice was low, but steady: "If none claim the ship, then none shall be blamed. Let us forbid such machines, and guard the roads and seas together."
But his words fell into silence. None listened. Mistrust had become fire. The War of the Five Kingdoms had begun.
The wars that followed began with swords and arrows, but soon the world changed.
Atira moved first, turning merchant wealth into muskets and rifles. Markets that once sold wheat now thundered with gunfire. Farmers became soldiers, their volleys falling like storms upon the fields.
Aria followed, disciplined as stone. Their legions drilled in endless ranks, their rifles firing in perfect unison. Against them, no line could hold.
Lariance fought with shadows. They stole blueprints, bribed smiths, and built hidden workshops along their rivers. Their armies were small, but their spies made them dangerous, striking where enemies were weakest.
Iron, slow to stir, at last unleashed its forges. Mines bled ore, furnaces roared, and in time they surpassed all others. They built not only rifles, but cannons, ironclads, and armored wagons that crawled on chains across the mud. From the smoke of their foundries rose the first age of true industry.
The old age of knights was dead. The age of gunpowder and steel had come.
But it was Naryan who suffered most.
Their wooden fleets, pride of centuries, met the ironclads and burned like tinder. Admirals who had never known defeat watched their ships sink in hours. "We are not beaten by men," one captain spat as his deck burned. "We are beaten by fire itself."
Desperate, Naryan bought stolen muskets, copied foreign rifles, begged for cannons. But their forges were weak, their wealth thin, their people weary. Always behind, always borrowing, they became a kingdom of imitations. Once masters of the seas, they were now beggars at the tables of war.
The Free Road was no longer free.
Cities once open to travelers became fortresses. Farmers once proud of their harvests now dug trenches in bloodied fields. Smoke choked the skies, and thunder rolled not from storms but from cannons.
The Iron King, now grey and bent, lived long enough to see his dream shatter. From his balcony he watched the roads burn, the rivers choke with corpses, the forges cough endless fire.
His last words, spoken not to heirs but to the people, were remembered in every kingdom:
"Guard the roads… let them be free again."
But the roads were already broken. The peace was gone.
Thus ended the Sweet Years.
And thus began the long, unyielding reign of Gunpowder and Steel.
It is a story about 5 kingdoms and why a war started
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