King Julius II

Life: 68-173 Fourth Era

Reign: 68-173 Fourth Era

Spouse: Priscilla of Rub

Predecessor: King Julius I

Successor: King Julius III

Biography

Early Reign

Born shortly before his father's death, his mother Mariam and his father's loyal warrior guards crowned him immediately king and ferried him away from the newly consecrated capital city of Port Emerald. Dissidents arose across the newly formed kingdom, but these were swiftly put down. Mariam ruled for King Julius II, acting as the regent until he reached the age of 14. Until then, King Julius II was taught history and political theory by several wandering priests of Manh, recruited and brought in from the Southern Continent.

On his 14th birthday, King Julius II took on the responsibilities of being the king. By this time, multiple rebellions had occurred, leaving the kingdom weak and divided. Support for the new monarchy had diminished over time as rival nobles secured more and more influence in different villages. King Julius's first act was to call the first Council of Rubies, inviting both loyal and disloyal nobles to Port Emerald. Driven by curiosity or greed, most of the invitees attended the meeting. At the council, King Julius II offered the nobles land and political power if they swore loyalty to him and supplied troops to his army, a method governance taught to him by the priests. Individually convinced by his proposal and distrustful of losing political power to their personal rivals, the nobles of the kingdom swore fealty to King Julius II and supplied his army with their troops.

Northern Expansion

King Julius II embarked on a series of conquests against the warlords that occupied the devasted northern lands of the Krystal mountain foothills. King Julius II proved to be a capable general, defeating several of the scattered warlords in quick succession in 83 Fourth Era. The rest of the warlords rallied under the banner of Caule the Tall, banding together to defeat the invading Krystallans. Caule the Tall engaged King Julius II and the Krystal army outside of the town of Graffi. It was a victory for King Julius II due to the betrayal of Caule by one of the warlords. Defeated, Caule the Tall led the remainder of his army northwards towards the Krystal mountains. Together with both his army and a significant number of the population of the region loyal to him, he led the migratory group through the mountains and eventually into the northern fenlands, where they would settle and eventually become the Nordeners. King Julius II, back in the hill lands and now unopposed, quickly conquered the region and granted his nobles control of the region.

Eastern and Western Alliances

Word of the rapidly growing Krystallan kingdom spread to the surrounding territories. To the east lay the desolate land of the Rub, a fractured empire that had long since fallen into decline. The emperor, a descendant of the knights and warriors of the Great Conquest, both admired and feared King Julius II's ambition, likening him to the heroes of old. He offered Julius his daughter in marriage, a move to both protect Rub and ensure the continuation of the royal line. While Mariam, Julius's mother, disapproved of the marriage, King Julius accepted the emperor's offer and took Priscilla of Rub as his bride. The young and ambitious kingdom of Krystalla thus began to slowly integrate and merge with the dying empire of Rub, ensuring their continued survival together.

With his eastern border secured, Julius II turned his attention westward. Instead of the flat floodplains and fenlands that made up Rub, to the west was vast sways of empty forests. Within the woods were the scattered tribes of the Konai, a semi-nomadic people who long ago occupied the plains and hill country that were now occupied by the Krystal people. While timid and reclusive by nature, they had been known to attack settlements on the edge of the forest, and few people occupied the area for fear of attack. Driven by the need for a steady supply of lumber, King Julius II sent a expeditionary army led by General Titius deep into the forest to negotiate land rights with the Konai. The expedition disappeared into the woods and would not reemerge for three years. By then, King Julius II had lost hope that his army would ever return, and threw a fourteen day feast in celebration of their return. General Titius completed his mission and managed to convince the Konai to allow logging operations to resume in the forest, exchanging the lost forested land with crop land in the desolate lands of Rub. King Julius was skeptical of the loyalty of the new subjects, but General Titius convinced him that the Konai would be loyal by pointing out several updates: part of the expeditionary force had intermarried with women of the different tribes, he had resolved several tribal disputes and had been named chief of chiefs, and the land in question was holy to the Konai and considered to be the birthplace of their people. Convinced, Julius allowed the migration of the Konai people to repopulate the empty Rubian lands.

Late Reign

The later part of King Julius II's reign was characterized by large-scale construction projects. With the passing of the Rubian emperor, Julius II and the now Empress Priscilla reorganized the Kingdom of Krystalla and the Rub Empire into the Krystal Empire. This reorganization gave Julius large amounts of resources from the Rubian treasuries, allowing him to enact mass change across the empire. Cognizant of his people's past and skills, he incentivized trade within the empire by constructing and repairing roads connecting every major settlement. At the third Council of Rubies, Julius II expanded the council to include Konai and Rub nobles into the Krystal nobility, further integrating the three cultures together. The Krystal nobility resented the change at first, but after the disastrous Wool Rebellion, they opted to follow Julius's plans. Under his guidance, the scattered Krystal villages and towns became a unified nation, quickly becoming a major trade hub for the entire southern coast of Sappira.

Death and Legacy

Julius II would reign well into his old age, continuing his policy of mass construction of infrastructure and trade routes. He died in his sleep in 173 Fourth Era, reigning for over a hundred years and guiding the minor kingdom to be an empire.

While he did not develop further on his father's governing system, the influence of Rubian law helped provide a foundation for the future Krystal legal system that would become dominant for the entirety of the Fourth Era.