Notable Elenrians

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Queen Akel II / "Palki"

Akel II of the Alpla royal bloodline is the currently reigning monarch and the regional head of state for Takpoe. Fairly young for a Queen, she was coronated after the death of her mother, Queen Akel I in 1854 by disgruntled pro-noble assassins during the War of the Third Gloryheight, which left the nation in a weakened state after fighting off the noble armies. Pulled from a then Martial duty as a soldier in the Royal Army manning an outpost in the badlands, she found herself with little political experience and capitulated to her ministers' advice to agree to Kumosenkan terms of surrender in 1860. Pressure and threats by her own court about her suitability to lead resulted in an essential house arrest within the Kesternrim Citadel comples, where she serves as head of state in only name. On paper, her authority is required for many of TAKPOE's functions- but in practice, her court has largely taken it upon themselves to execute what they believe will best serve the interests of TAKPOE.

Public information of the Queen is sparse at best, but with quite literally nonexistent public appearances save for the scarce holiday, the fact that she is a prisoner of her own government is a public secret. While little can be done on the matter for the common Elenrian, many are sympathetic- Queen Akel II is considered far too young and inexperienced to be a Queen, and the pains of life are largely blamed upon the High-Crested and for some, Kumosenkan.

The sorry fact of the matter is that the Queen is not completely deaf to the matters at hand- her sparse political allies and loyalists in her court of High-Crested do their very best to uphold her will where possible and deliver information, but with the government infighting so deeply, it is difficult to parse the information fed to her by half a dozen couriers claiming to be from the same person. Nevertheless, the Queen is not one to give up easily despite the worst of storms, and rumor has it she plans to return- one way, or the other.

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Martial General Vaiseln Api / "Seria"

A senior military inselni Martial officer from the late reign of Akel I, Vaiseln witnessed the fall of her beloved Queendom in 1860 as a major general of the Second Waitian Citadel Royal Brigade, stationed near Vono. A veteran of the War of the Third Gloryheight only years earlier, she had the option to defect to the anti-Kumosenkan Royalists building up down south- not yet sworn to the new Queen in the chaos of the previous war, she instead chose to join the service of the new government and served with distinction at the Battle of Kalvera, putting down a combined Greatfern and royal army remnant force that had gathered to oppose the newly-occupying Kumosenkan forces with royal-era muskets. Finally sworn into the new government in 1867, she would continue to climb the ranks and serve Akel II. 

Following the orders of the Oimei Protocol in 1869 by the provisional colonial government, she would be responsible for the suppression of the 1871 Famine Rebellion, in addition to the pacification of numerous uprisings that emanted from the leftover dissent of the previous and current political upheaval. Through her distinction in service and her seniority as an officer, she was promoted to the position of a  High-Crested among the Queen's cabinet in 1893, where she would replace the vacant space left behind by the defection of the previous Crested of Blades to the Royalists.

A notedly staunch supporter of the Queen's rule despite Akel II's current status of being under house arrest, General Api is one of the exceptions to the rest of the High-Crested, holding far fewer political connections than most would expect from such a high position. Nevertheless, a handful of reserve units in her command are known to hold ties to the Office of the Interior, whose dealings with the Elenrian military are noticeably smoother than their cooperation with other branches of the TAKPOE government. For the most part, however, the soldiers keep to their stations in the ports and big cities, as well as manning the border with Eleria and Frannere.

Despite all her efforts and experience, her command is not without flaws: the General is constantly grappled with the issues of corruption within the ranks and an inept officer corps rife with nepotism and favoritism. Armies are hardly ever simple matters, and while she may be a well-seasoned commander, the reform and repair that the Territorial Army will need, indeed, the whole of Elenria will need- is titanic in volume. To even begin resolving the issue will take extensive resources and time, a problem that the General is beginning to worry may be larger than her colleagues of the High-Crested believe it to be.

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Broken of Crowns Kalti Sekra / "Lao Bo"

Among the oldest of the Queen Akel II's court, Sekra is a notable outlier. A former Martial captain of the Jade Citadel Guard that served as Queen Akel I's bodyguards, she was absent attending to then-Princess Akel II as part of a bodyguard by personal order of the Queen and thus was absent from the Kesternrim Citadel when her fellow guards and monarch were slain by the Greatfern assassins. While she would've determinedly gone off to join the army to find vengeance for her dead Queen, she was convinced by fellow Jade Citadel Guard to remain with Akel II and help raise her to succeed her mother. As the civil war ended in 1858, Sekra experienced a total mental breakdown and blinded herself out of guilt for the death of Queen Akel and resigned after assisting raise the Silver Citadel Guard, responsible for the new Queen's protection. However, as Kumosenkan invaded and annexed Elenria in 1860, she was personally recalled to Kesternrim by former colleagues of the Jade Citadel Guard, who asked to help form a new government that would become TAKPOE.

At first, Sekra took a conservative mindset to politics, too regarding with the rest of the High-Crested that the young Queen was simply unfit for rule until at her current age. Faced with turmoil, the nascent TAKPOE was beset by the beginnings of the FNCAE and ex-Greatfern rebels who sought to undermine Kumo authority. As Minister of the Interior, Sekra was responsible for the secret police forces and home affairs of the new administration but differed from her peers in view of what direction to take the new government, as she still intended to defer to Queen Akel II at some point, and accordingly made all officers under her command swear loyalty to the Queen instead of TAKPOE itself.

In retribution, she found the other departments of Takpoe stripping her office of resources to tend to state matters, from funding to personnel and authority. While there was little she could do on the matter, she used her position as the Interior Office Minister by conducting large-scale anticorruption audit campaigns that conveniently froze the assets of rival regional departments of government. While this hampered what TAKPOE could do, it severely slowed down the other efforts of the Ministries to conduct their affairs, and allowed Sekra to carry out her own agenda of preparing the country for the Queen's return within a century. Retaliation by her peers brought her office into direct conflict on the streets of Elenria's cities as government-sponsored militia clashed with Sekra's people in violent skirmishes in an attempt to counter the effects of her campaigns. This only spurred Sekra to redouble efforts to counter the effects of her colleagues- not wanting to elicit attention from the Kumo governor, she formed the Commissariats with the pretext to bypass government inefficiency and target corruption and subversive elements within Elenria. 

In reality, these Commissariats were used for more than simple anti-corruption campaigns and domestic intelligence- Sekra formed various departments who could deal diplomatically with the extremely different factions that riddled Takpoe, either to slow down what she perceived to be the dangerous influence of her colleagues and other Elenrian factions, or maintain national stability to avoid potential loss of production needed to keep Kumo eyes away from Elenrian affairs. In the process, they were to counter the influence of rival government branches- use their auditing powers to storm rival government office buildings and seize convictable material, imprison officials on false pretenses to slow down the actions of rival campaigns, and so forth.

Yet in recent years, the failures of the Takpoe regime, supposedly headed by the absent Queen, have only garnered a wave of growing anger within Elenria. Rumors are spreading that Her Majesty is little more than a political prisoner locked in her own home, and the Regency of the High-Crested are those who are actually leading the country. As the world's political situation deteriorates, Sekra changed her stance on the Queen's position as ruler- if she does not learn to rule now with the world before her, she will do even more poorly in the face of greater disasters. Though her peers may disagree, Sekra has readjusted her priorities to restore the Queen to the throne now, with herself as a teacher- no matter what it might take.

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Mun Yian Fo / Baisen Amosha / "Yian"

Yian is young adult Inselni who works as a seamstress at an Elenrian textile workshop in Merritaun, where she lives. Raised with traditional rules of strict inselni honor, Yian is an uncompromising adherent to the edicts she was raised with, trying her utmost to keep with her personal values while adhering to the system of honor she was raised to follow.

Friends: Dai Uina Shi, Chiho Sasaki

Bio will update as the story thread progresses!