Proclamations from the Royal House of Senuspur

[Stranger]

People of Ring 99! I have a grand—no, a resplendent—announcement to make! Now that our Suitor has been so warmly received, the Knaves of 99 are hereby completely and totally dissolved.

After all, what need is there for thieves, when we are the masters?

It may perhaps surprise some of you to be informed that our lord and master—the great Count Senuspur—was in fact the owner and manager of the Spinning Groat Casino; the brokers of title within this Peerage.  Thus, in that capacity, and through the assimilation of ancient House Sunpurse into his own formidable House Senuspur, he shall reign as first among Peers. Henceforth and forevermore, ascendant Senuspur shall assume the sovereign role of "bannerhouse."

And as bannerhouse, we shall begin at once, guiding this Peerage towards one great and inexorable goal: the DESTRUCTION of the USURPER KING.

That is all.

[Stranger]

Friends, I know many of you are confused—and some frustrated—by recent events. I understand that. All our lives we were lied to, we were deceived! The Royal Archive. The Royal Herald. The Royal Court. They built a regime of mendacity. But that ends now.

Whatever disagreements you may have had, or thought you may have had, with the Knaves, they are no more, for the Knaves are no more. A new chapter begins now. Lord Senuspur of the House of Kings extends a hand of friendship to all who are ready to shrug off the false Usurper.

The age of lies is drawing to a close. The Sun of Truth rises. I am a scholar, and it is the truth I will pursue. I fear no 'royal' edict of the Usurper. I will build a clock. I will decipher the runes hidden in the deepest corners of the City. I will master Agartha. I will learn all there is to learn.

A new day breaks. Let us walk in its sunlight together, as friends. Let us bear witness to the rebirth of this City, and let us in turn be reborn with new purpose. Let us breathe fresh air.

[Stranger]

The Royal Herald, a man who at every Dispensary insults and degrades you. He, calls you dogs, scum, traitors, and tells you to fight each other for the magnificent gifts of what? Dogfood? Spoiled meat? Old saucers? Mere scraps from the Royal Court's table! There is your "King." There is his "love."

If you want to be the slobbering, trembling animals the Royal Herald says you are, then by all means! Continue to cling to a senile Usurper's dead and broken regime! Continue to live in the sewage and ruin! But if you despise the mendacity and decay that slowly strangles this City, then your has come: cast off your chains.

[Stranger]

Subjects of the realm of Count Senuspur, you have felt the cold wind of change cross your cheek. Do not fear it. Welcome it! For—carried upon it—the Lord of Lords brings your salvation!

He has returned to his people. And now he shall break the false cycle of a False King. Time shall march forward at long last. Our history shall no longer be taken from us and destroyed. Wrongs, perhaps beyond your comprehension, shall be made right in these fateful years ahead.

Rejoice, fellow citizens! For in the war to come, you shall finally be set free.

[Stranger]

Leal subjects of my Count Senuspur! I bring to you news most momentous! For in three days, the Council of Peers shall be called to session, and you shall receive your instructions for the first steps of a campaign that shall shake this City to its foundations.

Long have we been bound in this decaying ruin, imprisoned by walls that cut deep into the earth and reached far into the sky. Long has the Court of the Usurper hoarded its treasures, its luxures, its wealth! Long have they deprived our people of splendors that they so gluttonously savor!

But no more! Under the bold vision of your Count, your liberation is at hand! For the first of our great works shall be to construct a great colossus of war,—bound in magic and power—a siege instrument of such furious strength that it shall BREAK DOWN these WALLS forever!

Rejoice, brothers! For your liberation is at hand! All hail Count Senuspur!

[Stranger]

I come bearing grave news.

For aeons, this City has meandered on beneath the gaze of its distant King. Settlements have risen and fall, empires have expanded and collapsed, lives have sparked brief and then been guttered out between the winding and endless alleys. Through it all, you have stretched your arms outward, seeking to glorify, to honour, to praise his royal highness.

Yet just as you may admire the forest or the wildland from afar, it is only your removal from its situation that warrants it. Should you ever go to pierce the undergrowth yourself, you will find nothing more than pestilence and the rank anarchy that man and civilisation sprung from.

I say to you it is only with this necessary distance that you could ever love your slovenly and savage King. You must know that our kind, not just humans but their lower civilised subjects too, are unimportant to his station; are not included in his City's estimations and design. You all live fretful lives and die ignobly, under the yoke of strife that is within his infinite and awesome power to avert; and it has continued this way for untold generations.

When the lizards rose from their fetid swamp to throw bronze shackle onto the necks of honest men, I know not where your perfect King was.

Perhaps he watched your ancestors broken with little more than apathy?

Perhaps he was too busy consorting with the fantastical beasts and freaks that make his court to even notice?

But, as you can see plain as day about you, your King abandoned you all. You, his first and most loyal subjects, the true blooded inheritors of his City and his Glory. He abandoned you to subjugation and despair while he grew portly and merry within his palace. What is more, these reptiles are nothing more than the most recent in a long line of foreign powers he has allowed subdue you. The last few giants, who once broke men apart to drink their marrow, are even afforded a place at his table for their services to the Crown.

This is the company your King chooses to keep instead of you, my men; this is how he has repaid this Ward for your fealty and your service.

Know, too, that his works and wonders, even those you look upon with amazement, are projects of nothing more than whimsy and ego. You will have heard, no doubt, that these Ringwalls were raised to limit the spread of the lizardfolk, at the request of those true-blooded heroes the Daring Swords.

I tell you this is a lie.

Those four brave humans did indeed beseech their King, so that he might once more emerge; this part is true. Yet instead of returning, chastened, to his duties, he was overcome with a great wroth at being disturbed and reminded of his failings. He went out to the balcony of his palace and began a great and terrible spell at once, the first he had deigned worthy of his efforts in countless years.

He raised the City Walls at once. Not to foil their enemies, no. He did this to ensure his feasting would not be disturbed again so easily in future. And then he cast them out to brave the long trip home unaided, and he returned to his revelry.

This is your King; a petty child whose moods swing between apathy and tantrum.

A mere man, unfit for the responsibility or station thrust upon him.

You look upon me, an outsider, an ambitious and grasping man; and perhaps you hate me, or even fear me, because of this. But know that everything I do, I do for our sake; for the sake of humankind, to which my obeisance and fealty are devoted. Just as yours should be devoted to me. We have been forced into obscurity and ignominy; to eking like rats among the distant Rings.

I say no more.

The King is of human blood, and it is to us he owes his loyalty. Our right, our birthright, is Ring 1, and we shall stop at nothing until it is our kind that can wander freely his palace grounds and enjoy the fruit and succulence offered there. If our King is disloyal, we shall correct this. If he tries to dissuade us with high walls, we shall tear them down. If he tries to dissuade us with high walls, we shall tear them down. Our time of obscurity is over. We are done begging for scraps from this pretender. A new dawn is upon us! And we shall take what is ours!