Kingdom Under

"I’ve been informed that the position of the King Under the Mountains is that ‘since only dwarves own property, only dwarves can be stolen from’. I’m afraid that if you insist on getting your family jewels back, my lord, we will have to buy them."

―Official state missive from Cygnus of Liesse, ambassador to the Kingdom Under

The Kingdom Under is the most powerful polity in Calernia. Established by the Dwarves, it covers over two thirds of the continent and is composed of a network of underground tunnels and cities.

General Information

The King Under is the ruler of this mighty nation.

While it’s underneath much of Calernia, the Kingdom of the Dead is a notable exception. It’s believed that tunnels have been dug all around it and molten steel was used to plug them in to protect themselves from the Dead Kings influence.

Despite being a great power, Catherine Foundling believes they don’t like to make commitments to the surface world and this is borne out by the events of the story. Their only political associate is the Refuge though even then, it’s a very hands-off relationship. This is partially due to the complications that result due to the size of their nations - inevitably both villains and heroes pop up regularly and they’re still trying to figure out how to make things work.

Despite their general non-interference policy, the dwarves claim ownership of all goods deep enough underground which makes mining effectively impossible for other polities. This is in part what makes Praes such a rich nation.

The size of their country is reflected in their army - William predicts “no single nation had a military whose size equaled even the tenth of what the dwarves could muster if they felt like it”. They use the heaviest infantry on the continent and exports siege weapons via Mercantis.

History

It’s unknown how the dwarves came to be the prominent underground kingdom on Calernia however several incidents have been outlined.

At an unspecified period in time - presumably before the Miezan invasion - they managed to drive out the goblins onto the surface world and their current home of the Grey Eyries.

Most of the surface nations have extensive non-interference laws with regards to the Kingdom Under. This dates back to when Procer’s principality of Iserre diverted a river into one of their mining operations and in retaliation, the dwarves sunk the city underground.

Trivia

• As of the tenth crusade, the Kingdom Under is in another expansion phase.