Great Northern War

The Great Northern War was the final conflict between the Zani Empire and the Northern Empire. Beginning under Emperor Zzunnon in 652 LC, the war brought Zani armies through successive Northern capitals and ended in the magical catastrophe known as the Incident.

Zani advance¶

The Zani captured the first capital of the United Northern Empire in 660 LC. By 662 LC they had conquered the second capital despite calls for peace, forcing the remaining Northern leadership back toward Petramonis. The campaign demonstrated the military strength of the late Zani Empire and the inability of the Northern Empire to halt a sustained imperial advance.

The Zani began the siege of Petramonis, the last Northern capital, in 668 LC. With two capitals already lost and the invading armies surrounding the city, the Northern state had little conventional means of survival.

Theolosius and the Incident¶

Theolosius the Mad, the last archmage of the Northern Empire, retreated to chambers beneath the castle and searched texts dating to before the Age of Wonder. Those records described the Four Great Gods sealed within Divine Wells. Theolosius sought their power as a final weapon against the Zani.

At Petramonis he opened the well of Melodias. The released power destroyed the capital and its surrounding lands, split the continent, altered the climate, and began the Great Collapse. Emperor Zzunnon and his appointed heir died in the catastrophe along with much of the imperial military gathered for the campaign.

End of the Northern Empire¶

The war did not end with an orderly Zani victory. Petramonis was annihilated, the Northern Empire collapsed by 672 LC, and its survivors fled to Polaria. Within a few generations those refugees had forgotten many achievements of their former civilization.

The Zani victors were also shattered. The loss of the emperor, heir, and royal legions produced the Crisis of the Seventh Century. The Razani and Nazani branches soon established rival imperial centers on opposite sides of the new sea. The Great Northern War therefore destroyed the Northern Empire while turning an apparent Zani triumph into the beginning of imperial fragmentation.

See also: Great Collapse, Theolosius the Mad, Northern Empire, and Timeline.