Radix

"What say you of faraway lands beyond the sea, Gallicus? Incomparable to this savage earth, where legends are written every day"

-Vitruvius M. Mercer, Imperial senator.

Radix is a continent located in the western half of Forsqorn. It comprises the Imperial Coast in the east, the Great North in the north, the Copper Plains in the northwest, the Wildlands in the farthest-most west, Drowsy Acres in the southwest, and the Vineyard Peninsula and the Golden Horn in the south and is bordered by the Reyharice Ocean, the Tyrael Sea, the North Sea, the Saffron Sea, Shatyr's Well, and the Tempest Straits.

Roughly 7.2 million square kilometers in size, it is the largest of the continents. With a variety of climate ranging from arctic to subtropical, a wide array of flora and fauna could be found throughout the region. Considered to be the homeland of the humans, dwarves, wood elves, and halflings, Radix's position have been central throughout history in the known world.

Politically, it is now divided into three states: Pax Imperium, centered on Pax in the southwest, the Merchant Republics of Sommerso, centered on Sommerso in the south, and the Great North, nominally centered on Farvel in the north. As the dominant power on the continent for more than four hundred years, Pax have enjoyed great success within its vast territory. However, Sommerso is quickly gaining a foothold alongside the empire as an economic giant. The Great North remains a client state of Pax after their near-dissolution during the Autumn War in the 400ANs and, while not a sovereign state, the Bannerlords have accrued significant political influence in Radix, operating from their historical headquarters in Stormfront.

Radix was also once home to the Blue Kingdoms, a collection of human monarchies which at times organized themselves in loose confederations mostly in the west, but they were destroyed and subjugated by the Imperials over centuries. The last of them, the Midfairs Commonwealth, quietly dissolved as late as the mid 350ANs.

Radix is the birthplace of the Sovereign Five religion, followed by a large majority of humans and halflings, devotedly or casually. The Velelduhr group of pagan religions remain widespread amongst the dwarves, even under growing pressure of the Sovereign Five from social and economic forces. Animistic folk religions are still central to wood elf life while amongst human and halfling populations have dwindled.

Etymology
"Gaze up upon Our branches and bow your heads to Those superior, united. Before daybreak arrives, when the foolish and cold-hearted shall render it amongst your roots, disfigured, and bow no more"

-The Offerings of Placidianus, Book IV, Chapter 13 "The Daybreak"

In Paxian mythology, the Radii are the roots of the Fatum Arbor, the Tree of Destiny, where the Sovereign Five is considered to reside at, specifically in serene, cloud palaces on the Ramii, the branches of the tree. Imperial philosopher and historian Caesatius G. Florus believed that it is derived from Heroic Age Proto-Paxian apra, meaning 'rays' or 'spokes', and Mythical Draconic baldriario, meaning 'anchor' or 'foundation'.

Another supposed relationship is with the alternative Blue Kingdomite name Irridia and whether this name originates from the same Proto-Paxian/Mythical Draconic derivation or is the true origin of the contemporary Imperial Common term. According to early Classical Age Blue Kingdomer priest and chronicler Edmund Amberbane, Irridia was first introduced as Ar'edea, by high elven ruler Grand Duke Andrathath Kalpeiros during his campaign in the continent known as the Crystal War in the 1640ANs. Unfortunately, no traces of Ar'edea could be found in classical High Elvish or the scarce historical records, making the theory irreputable to contemporary Imperial scholars. Instead, Raedi'is is used, borrowing directly from Radix, or instead Neva Afto'ratoream, literally "land of the Imperials". The usage of Irridia waned alongside the fall of the Blue Kingdoms, now confined to usage in folk religion in the south end of the Great North Coast.

The Great North clans did not have a name for the continent but referred to territory beyond the Great North as the vilmark, meaning "strange land" or "lawless land". The Farren wood elven tribes did not believe there was a world beyond the Copper Plains, which they called An'deugh, only receiving such information after significant contact with the encroaching Imperium.

Definition
"I found it, Fortuna. Beyond the ice groves of the ancient dwarves, beyond the barren wastes, lies a solitary bridge to Erlune. If I only chart these waters, no longer shall the serene elven plains be a walled garden and just out of our reach, guarded by Shatyr's hellish deep. I shall return, my love, a man who traversed beyond the arctic. Beyond our last frontier"

-The final letter by Lord Reyharice the Bannerlord to his wife, Lady Fortuna, before his disappearance in the Arctic Traverse.

Contemporarily, the border of Radix is defined by the contiguous shoreline of the so-called "continental Radix" as well as several major landmasses and islands surrounding it, most being in the Great North and the Arctic Traverse. It was first mapped out in its entirety by explorer Lord Reyharice the Bannerlord between the 110ANs until the 70ANs, based on pre-existing maps and his own explorations.

At several points as late as the Heroic Age, the name Radix was only applicable to a certain portion of the continent, specifically the Imperial Coast, while further, sometimes undiscovered reached were referred to as Fortis Kornos, meaning the "outer world", which later turned into Forsqorn. This idea was shared between the Blue Kingdoms (who called it the Wildlands) and Pax Imperium, the two principle political entities in the continent for thousands of years until the current consolidation of Imperial territory, the meeting between them and dwarven lands, and the establishment of the Southern Merchant States elevated the definition to the continent in its entirety, which was widely stipulated by the beginning of the Tempest Straits Wars in the mid-60ANs until it was set down by Lord Reyharice.

Pre-Mythic Age
Not much of Pax is truly known when it comes to the period before the Mythic Age. The Imperial Palace hieroglyphs, as well as the scant other Mythical Draconic artifacts, speak of this time as an incomprehensibly long era of innocence and abundance. An era before the younger races, servants made as amusement of the dragonborns' mortal paradise, 'invented' war and rose against their masters. Radix, according to these finds, were supposedly under dragonborn dominion into the Mythic Age. While differentiating draconic findings of the Iomorn Ascendancy beyond the Classical Age can prove to be difficult, the delineation adopted between the Mythic and the Pre-Mythic Age is drawn based on this long peace.

Many religions and traditions do speak of a similar peace, swapping the position of the dragonborns around with their own. According to continental human tradition, and that of the Sovereign Five religion, the humans, the second race created by the Sovereigns, was granted a single, whole world to rule over until folly and cruelty forced the gods to crack it into the disparate continents it is now during The Daybreak, with the Blue River a font of refuge for the forsaken population. According to high elven tradition, and that of the Isyse Alarian religion, Radix was a planar ark in which all the other civilized races arrived in together, led by their progenitor called the First Amongst the Last, which they believe to have hailed from the plane of Ae before its destruction.

Mythic Age
Just like eras before, the Mythic Age in Radix is a mystery to most, hence the name. Spoken as a time of slow reckoning to the dragonborn empire through constant strife, most artifacts of the ancient Iomorn Ascendancy surviving today came from this period. The fragile few reported findings are in the hands of private individuals but one, the Star of the Last Messenger found in the deserts of Ushat, is under safeguard in the Galleria de Belva in Barche.

As the Acendancy collapsed, evidence suggest the younger races begun to migrate and congregate in large numbers, forming their first independent communities along many fertile regions in the world. In Radix, this was principally along the vast Blue River system and around Salera Bay in between the Vineyard Peninsula and the Golden Horn. As they are, for all intents and purposes human, the faraway Narawarans and their origins at this time remain unknown.

The Mythic Age's end is marked by the historically agreed upon date of the First Mi'shuridet Event, a speculated sudden catastrophe which saw the overnight annihilation of most of the Ascendancy and its now-divided imperial holdings, at 6234AN. Pieced together remnants indicate as many as a hundred contesting territories in Pax that divorced themselves from the Ascendancy by this point, almost all vanishing without a trace. It was speculated that an arcane defense enshrouded around the Valdir Islands, the epicenter of the dragonborn empire located south of the continent, spared it from said destruction, a speculation later confirmed during the Second Mi'shuridet Event.

Heroic Age
The first legendary kings and queens of man laid claimed to fertile grounds along the Blue River branching through the area. This was the same place their ancestors have survived and tamed for almost four thousand years since the disappearance of their draconic masters in the period sometimes called the Savage Intermission.

An era of rises and falls, the Early Heroic Age in Radix saw the beginnings of polities in the Copper Plains, mostly in the northern rim in between the deep forests and open expanse of the plains itself. Both were sanctuaries of the wood elves, miraculous migrants from their homeland of Erlune across the sea. By the end of that tumultuous four thousand years of re-discovering civilization, the Sovereign Five religion was founded by prophet and self-proclaimed Sentinel of both Lumina and Artensia, the half-elf One-Eyed Herald of Old, in the ancient kingdom of Sistithica (modern day Guard's Run).

During the Middle to Late Heroic Age, high elven armies landed on Radix's shores to re-introduce a long-extinguished tradition: imperialism. They did so sporadically but decisively between the 1720ANs and 1430ANs, with its apex in 1647AN, when King Andrathath Kalpeiros waged his famed campaign which resulted in the subjugation of several human kingdoms on the Imperial Coast and the unification of the high elves. This period saw the first human lords and ladies holding considerable influence in the lives of the peasantry as well as the legitimacy of their monarchs, while the raiding dwarves began to venture far beyond their homeland in ever advanced longships. By this time as well, the sheltered pastures of Cherry Bumpkins were significantly settled by halflings through their sophisticated agricultural methods.

The return of Mi'shuridet marked the end of the Heroic Age in Radix, halting the high elven overtures and returning the land to a period of upheaval and uncertainty. Dubbed The Dark Migrations era, still within living memory of some of the oldest elves, widespread famine and looting defined this time.

Classical Age
Almost a hundred years after her re-appearance, Mi'shuridet was finally and thoroughly vanquished. However, the upending caused by her reign of chaos left many homeless, diseased, and famished. While the power of the high elves waned, many human kingdoms also suffered and fell.

The desperate dwarves, who were unable to benefit from raids due to the threats of Mi'shuridet and her minions, saw their wintry home as ever more treacherous due to her presence. Monsters and beasts encroached on their land, until finally the leviathan Dalla wreaked havoc in Farvel. This desperation brought them together under the leadership of Ofeig Wood-Bottomed, hero-founder of Clan Woodbottom, to form the confederation simply known as The Great North.

During this Dwarven Golden Age, many dwarven settlements were founded throughout the continent, including those of Kisping Gaetersson, who settled on the Great North Coast and ultimately ascended to the Sistithican throne, establishing the line of Dwarven Blue Kingdomer kings.