Formerly an angel by the name of Votumal, he was ranked within the lowest ranks for most of his existence. It seems it simply pleased him to remain as such. This preference was disrupted when the Sarim came under direct fire during the third campaign. Despite his menial position, his power distinguished him in battle beyond any of those of greater rank. He slew several prominent angels of the enemy armies. For his prowess, he immediately gained a seat on the diminished Sarim. During the next battle, the previous Magnus sacrificed himself to ensure the rest of his angelic cadre would survive, but rather than run, Votumal took up the Magnus’s sword and slew the four generals of the opposing army. By taking up the sword, he was committing heresy of the highest order, but even the other members of the Sarim were reluctant to press the matter. Votumal willingly gave up the sword and tried to turn his back on the war as penitence, but the other members of the Sarim denied him the luxury, offering both the sword and helm of the Magnus. Understanding that there were greater obligations than his own pursuits, Votumal relinquished his name and history and took up the powers and responsibilities of the Magnus.

Some time ago, after years of autonomy following the rise of order, the kingdoms of the veldt fell to a reckoning. The largest and most powerful kingdom of the plains was sundered by a war of succession. Several of the surrounding kingdoms favored different members of the royal family for the inheritance of the throne and pledged the loyalty of their people.

The candidates pushed, each with a claim to the crown and backed by the power of their neighbors. Armies were raised. Threats were made.

With the lines drawn, and a precious few kingdoms trying desperately to stay neutral, the lands once again darkened under the banners of war. The enormous kingdom split and the nobility turned against one another.

The skies wept and the land bled as battles tore the once peaceful and prosperous land. It was not the first war, but it was by far the greatest war that the plains had known since the ancient times.

It did not go unnoticed. The Seraphim became aware of the conflict, and judged none demonstrated the qualities needed for sovereignty, and by their acts of violence, they forfeit their right to rule. The angels of the Bastion descended and in a swift and brutal coup, seized control of the veldt kingdoms. The aristocracy was stripped of their lands and angelic lords were installed in their place.

The war came to an end, and their actions ensured no such war would ever take place again. The wounds of the principalities began to heal and with a unified hand guiding the veldt, they were led to a new era of prosperity.

But not every kingdom supported the new regime, and with little recourse, many abandoned the veldt altogether, craving a freedom that the Seraphim denied them, no matter how much peace they promised. Those few kingdoms who did not become embroiled in the war left the idyllic hills for the shaded forests and a new life guided by the Goliath. Their way of life changed, but they found a peace different from the one they left.

The human capital, Virhad, is the main merchant and travel hub for all the principalities, owing its prominence to the numerous crossroads that it was built upon. Resting in the central northeast of the western continent, it connects to virtually every other significant city on the continent. However, despite being the capital, it is not the military seat of power for the Principalities. The combination of the military and mercantile power, while making it substantially harder to assault, would also make it too tempting a target in a long scale campaign. The lack of a major military presence is reconciled by two primary factors. The first is the substantial company of the Cano Order, peacekeepers, that police the city. The second is the highest population of Seraphim outside Ketheres. They occupy the central fortress palace that was built in the name of the emperor prior to the seraphim coup. It has since been expanded upon greatly to accommodate its winged occupants. Within those walls, the Seraphim handle the logistics of making the Sarim’s proclamations a fact in an empire the size of the Principalities.

Military Capital- Located on the Eastern continent, the enormous headquarters of the Legion stands as the daunting and imposing slab of civilization it is. Here, soldiers are trained in vast numbers, and the officers handle the immense work of running a military the size of the Legion. This city is the nerve center for the might of the army, but it also serves as the living quarters for many of the families of the high officers. Of course, such a high concentration of people requires an equally complex infrastructure and the city has a substantial civilian population to accommodate the military’s presence. The city isn’t as monolithic as it would first appear though, as it is in fact a multitude of smaller forts and barracks scattered throughout the city. Many refer to (insert name here) as the Eastern Capital.

Port Albean- The single major port city in the Principalities is located on the eastern coast of the western continent along the Chayot Gulf. Other port towns exist, but none bar this one, can really compete with the monopoly of the Vedalken Republic’s ports on each side of the gulf.
Seats of the Sarim- Other cities of which the only note of real importance is the presence of the angelic lords that occupy their temple castles. More than half of them are located on the Western Continent.

Religion is an odd thing in the Principalities. While at one time, the occupants of the land worshiped the god Gevurah, the old god fell out of favor well before the Seraphim rose to become the aristocracy. Without a doubt though, the angelic nobility has had a profound effect on the practiced religion on the veldt. Organized worship has dropped away, while blessings of luck or guidance are asked of the specific provincial lord when needed. The former temples scattered throughout the principalities were restored and expanded to serve as the housing for the newly ascendant Sarim, who rule from their ancient castles. Invoking the Magnus is saved for the most dire of situations or serious of occasions.

The largest city of the Goliath is Cathair de'an Sinsear, where the elders of each clan come to meet in the ancient halls. The city is the single largest mercantile center in all the Green, and what marks it as such is the numerous ancient pits where the art of metallurgy took its first strides. It is nestled in the foothills of the Ishim mountains, butting right up against the flamekin territories.

Much of the population of the city is transitory, as the Goliath are naturally prone to wanderlust. While some bands of druids and nomads exist, there are also numerous stationary towns wherever there are fissures in the earth for them to forge with and rivers to slake the forests and their own thirsts.

For thousands of years, Goliath society was built on a foundation of tradition. Stories were passed down through oral tradition, and the elders were the political power, although the Goliaths themselves were far from political. The elders served mostly as a backbone for tradition, as well as arbiters for any who might violate the conventions of tradition. The words of the Elders were not law, certainly not in the way humans would understand them, but rather more akin to a father's commands to a small child. Over countless centuries, the reasons behind certain behavioral traditions were lost, but the Elders carried on the teachings of these traditions with a zeal equal to that of their predecessors. To even question the words of an Elder was to be a disobedient child in the eyes of the Elders, and most of the Goliath society.

Eventually, though, as the Elders lost their connection to the source of their traditions, certain members of Goliath society felt they were losing their connection with the Elders. The Elders had always been looked upon as father figures, and so society found it upsetting that they were losing that connection with them, almost like a child who ages to find his father's mind slipping away. So, in an effort to recapture the connection with the elders, certain fragments of society tried to delve into the depths of history, not to defy the Elders, but rather to rediscover the foundations of the traditions they clung to.

The Elders, however, viewed this in quite a different light. To them, this was an act of defiance, perhaps even an attempt to circumvent the Elders entirely. Naturally, they didn't all feel that way, and some Elders praised and even participated in the journey of past discovery. The most stringent traditionalists amongst the Goliath also opposed this new movement, but quite frankly, most people didn't care one way or the other. Many didn't even feel the subtle disconnection of the Elders in the first place.

Generations passed, and the division between the traditionalists and the historians grew increasingly, but slowly, greater. They were still one another's neighbors, friends, even brothers and sisters, but they were growing apart. Just as the Elders had eventually lost their connection with history, so too, ironically, did the historians lose their connection to their original mission. Their charge changed from discovering the origin of the Elder's tradition to discovering the origin of any tradition. Eventually, the historians became more. They became researchers, theorizers, scholars, perhaps, in a rudimentary way, academics.

Goliath society had begun to change, shifting, ever so slightly, away from a nomadic lifestyle to a sort of occasional-sedentary one. Some Goliaths, especially the smiths or the stone-masons, settled in pretty much one place. Most of the others would wander for a while, settle in one place for a while, and then wander again when the wanderlust grabbed them. The historians were more or less the same in this regard, wandering when they felt the need to research or map or dig something up, and settling down for a few seasons when they didn't. Of course, for the historians, the more they found and the more they wrote, the harder it became to travel around. This led to the founding of the Great Library, which was part library, part museum, as it contained everything that had been written by the historians (that had survived traveling through rain and heat and so forth), as well as any physical relics they may have stumbled upon.

The founding of the Library infuriated some of the Elders who believed it was a mockery of the oral tradition the Goliaths valued so highly. Others, however, felt it was an excellent way to keep tradition alive, and still more people, including a few more of the Elders, joined the historians. It was at this point that actual tension began to arise between the two factions of society, though initially, these problems were minor. Historians began actively trying to settle near the Library, and for longer periods of time, consequently (though unintentionally) monopolizing the local food supply, though no Goliath ever went hungry because of this. Slowly, over the course of two or three generations, the historians were firmly entrenched in the city. Traditionalists were still as welcome as always, but it didn't always feel that way.

All of this movement away from tradition and toward history began to worry the Elders who held strongly to tradition. Finally, these Elders made a conscious decision to expand their own influence and exert more formal authority. The Goliath had many celebrations throughout the year, but had two which were considered major, held in Cathair de'an Sinsear. Both of these were festivals in honor of Binah and Chokmah together, and were celebrated at the Summer and Winter Solstices. The Elders had recognized that while both factions still worshiped both deities, the historians were beginning to identify with Chokmah in their search for wisdom and secrets, and the Elders wanted to use that to reign them in. Therefore, at an Elder's council, it was decided that the festivals would no longer be dedicated to both. Instead, the Summer festival would be dedicated to Binah, whereas the festival of the Winter Solstice, when traveling was made more difficult, would be dedicated to Chokmah.

The Elders designed this to discourage the historians and their ilk, because they knew the Chokmah festival would have far fewer attendees than the Binah celebration. Unfortunately for them, their plan backfired, because although fewer Goliaths did attend, it began to foster the very division the Elders were trying to quell. It also provided a forum for the historians to educate and convert some of the traditionalists, who came just for the celebration, as they had done every year before anyway. After several years, as the division between the two festivals grew wider, the Chokmah festival was moved from Cathair de'an Sinsear to the Library city, and a few years later, the Library itself was rededicated to Chokmah.