Wannonia: 134 to 210
Murstallar II, who ruled until May 169, raised taxes on large guilds as well as tightened limits on wealth acquisition and the purchasing of other guilds. He also lifted trade tariffs, which helped to resolve tensions with the Edorans in a peace treaty in the year 137. As a result, peace and prosperity reigned throughout the nation of Wannonia, especially along the coast of the Inland Sea. After Murstallar II's death in May 169, his son, Murstallar III succeeded the throne. Murstallar III implemented a tax break to the flaxweed guilds after Tyrron Makorlan, a prominent guild member, proposed an idea to perfect the fertilizer invented by Sterrol centuries previously. Furthermore, the Emperor allowed these guilds to acquire more fields, inciting protest from other crop guilds. In 189, these guild owners met with the flaxweed guilds and the Emperor, himself, in the city of Aron, where crop fields were zoned equally between flaxweed, wheat, and barley. The result of this was economic prosperity in the farmlands, as well as an improvement in crop harvests. Upon his death in April 204, Murstallar III was succeeded by his son, Murstallar IV, who continued his father's policies. However, in May 210, he received a complaint from Gron, a Legion General, who stated that large numbers of Chemkans were settling in the fields, fighting Wannonians over land ownership, and growing crops unfamiliar to Wannonian society.
Cause for Chemkan Immigration
In previous years, climate change had made it more difficult to grow crops in the Chemkan countryside, as increased numbers of tropical storms caused flooding and land erosion. The Chemkans, though, began following an idea based off of Estrayon, where irrigation channels controlled by "valve-dams" were built to direct excess water into the ocean. Such an idea was successful, leading to better crop yields. However, beginning in the early 200's, the current carrying the tropical storms shifted further East over the Circlarian Ocean, leading to drought back in Chemko. As some months presented no rain at all, the land began to dry up, resulting in crop failure, and, inevitably, famine. Economic inequality and civil conflict ensued as corruption in the Chemkan Senate allocated most of the remaining food and resources to the rich Chemkan guild owners. With seemingly no hope here, Chemkans gravitated to testimony about plentiful rains and bountiful harvests in Wannonia. A great deal of Chemkans, as a result, began relocating to a section of Wannonian territory across the Chemkan border, where, in such territory, there lived other Chemkans descended from those who migrated in years past.
In response to Legion General Gron's complaint, Murstallar IV, in September 210, issued orders for settled Chemkans to leave, with such orders sneaking through additional land grants to the flaxweed guilds. By May 211, it became clear that the Chemkans were in protest, refusing to follow such orders. That November, Murstallar IV dispatched three Legions, who slaughtered some Chemkan settlers and forcibly drove out others.
Chemkan Senate Takeover
Between November 211 and April 212, these Chemkan settlers returned to their homeland, while a large number of them, disgruntled at their treatment, traveled to Corbo, where they began protesting in the streets. In May 212, the Chemkan Senate dispatched Chemkan Legions who quelled such uprisings in a brutal and violent manner. The protestors, in response, banded together and brought forward Chemkan Senate candidates calling for sweeping reforms to the dysfunctional Chemkan establishment. In September 212, the Senate elections occurred, but were rigged, leading to the victory and reelection of the pro-establishment Senators. In April 213, the protestors organized a coup, taking over the Senate meeting place and driving out the corrupt politicians inside. In the following month, remaining faithful to a democratic system, the rebels hosted a makeshift election, in which the reform Senators won. Subsequently, they passed policies that increased taxes on the large guilds, while using the wealth to help fund independent guilds. Like in Wannonia in 189, Chemkan land was zoned for equal ownership. In the years 213 and 214, the Chemkan Senate boosted funding for Chemkan Legions, as they recruited more people, for they were about to pursue an agenda: to take back the Wannonian borderlands and make it part of Chemko.
The Wannonia-Chemko War
In September 214, the Chemkans launched their initial assault on these Wannonian lands, during which they maintained a strong battlefront. As the Wannonians were able to do the same, though, it seemed as if the conflict was in a gridlock.
The Chemkans broke the gridlock by dispatching spellfire-concealed Chemkan soldiers, who would sneak into Wannonian Legion forts many miles to the Northwest. Here, they would secretly kill Wannonian soldiers at a rate of only a few at a time. With spellcrafting, these Chemkan assassins would disguise themselves as Wannonian Legion soldiers; and eventually, nearly all of the Legion forts in this region were, unknown to the Emperor or Wannonian authorities, taken over by Chemkans. On 1 April 217, the Chemkans in these occupied Legion forts launched an attack to the Southwest, over the disputed land. Wannonians here were trapped between this onslaught and the Chemkan front along the border, and were either slaughtered or forced to flee to the North. Eventually, the two Chemkan fronts met; and the land in between was under solid Chemkan occupation, as they forced out remaining Wannonian Legion troops.
On 1 June 217, Murstallar IV signed a treaty with the Chemkan Republic, respecting their sovereignty over this land.