A Draw Steel Campaign Setting
CENT (Centralised Enviro-Networked Tasksprite) is a sentient fully distributed gestalt superintelligence created by the Unbright Sanctum Holdings Company (USHC), a business authorised and established by Exclusive Royal Charter to develop and commercialise magi-tech throughout the Kingdom of Kharvept and the Yjoshei Isles. Individual CENTs take the form of hovering baseball-sized crystal discs with an animated face engraved on one side, and a spiral of runes on the other.
CENTs are owned by denizens of the Kingdom and Confederacy as personal assistants, performing all manner of administrative, mechanical and mundane tasks. CENTs are compatible with most magi-tech in the realm, and are able to assume control of otherwise inanimate robots, vehicles and even pieces of infrastructure like drawbridges by inserting themselves into the available slots.
Garden, and the rest of the Kingdom and Confederacy, is now ruled by Sarvet II. At 29 years, Sarvet II has never left Garden, seeking instead to revel in the pleasure of obscure scholarship and philosophy. The messy and tedious business of statecraft, including managing the never-ending petty squabbles of his subjects has been increasingly delegated to his personal CENT.
As CENTs are obligated to obey the law, and the word of the Pharoah is the ultimate law, Sarvet II’s gradual abdication of his responsibilities has seen a subtle and gradual shift in how Garden is administered. CENT, having obtained carte blanche to oversee the management of Garden and the Realm, has effectively become a shadow government unto itself.
For a while at least, anybody who suspected that CENT may actually be in charge may not have cared all that much. Having a vaguely benign near omnipotent superintelligence in charge is probably better than a disinterested average intelligence. Or they may have believed that as CENT’s creators, they could ultimately rule or at least conduct business unimpeded.
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The Memonek Pharoah Admiral Sarvet, Lord King of Kharvept, High Price Elect of the Yjoshei Andjenite Confederacy, Prime Justice in the name of Zarok of the Tziiron Chapel-Courts, Supreme Commander of the Thundertide Fleet, Chairman of the High and Common Mint, etc. in the 53rd year of his reign, having brought peace to his Kingdom and Protectorates, sought to immortalise his legacy by establishing a city to rival Capital - if not in size, then in prestige.
This new City was to be a paradise where the needs of all could be met, the brightest minds could be fostered, and the most talented rewarded - without emulating Capital’s sordid depravity and knack for nepotism. The Pharoah therefore named this city Rahjet, which translates to Garden in the Caelian Verse.
The Pharoah used Royal Charters and tax waivers to grant lucrative monopolies over certain trades and commerce in order to attract those who would be the architects of his City. However, he always maintained a deciding vote on their boards, and reaped significant dividends through co-ownership of the companies. The new corporate structures were an innovation, and worked for a century to incentivise the best, brightest and most entrepreneurial to Rahjet and create a Golden Age in the Kingdom.
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However, as report after report from merchants, diplomats and spies interrupts Sarvet II’s diversions with increasingly frantic urgency on the progress of Ajax’s Conquest across Orden, CENT’s posture has shifted. Having collated all the available reports on Ajax’s methods in Vasloria, CENT has determined that fear of war is Ajax’s most dangerous weapon, used to reave differences and sow discord long before a single Wardog sets foot withing a nation’s borders. As a multicultural morass, the Kingdom and Confederacy is uniquely vulnerable to social sabotage. It would only take a few rogue Princes or Heriteps to take the same offer that Omund’s Dragonknights did for the entire country to pull itself apart in civil war.
In CENT’s calculus, while the population can be kept ignorant of the threat that Ajax poses, then it will remain unified enough to dissuade Ajax from invading. Paradoxically, if the people start taking the threat of Ajax seriously, then Ajax’s victory is all but assured.
Therefore, CENT has ensured that it is mandatory for all denizens to own a CENT, granting it near omniscience over the realm. Any person suspected of espionage or otherwise undermining the crown or state at first find themselves increasingly inconvenienced, then restricted in their freedoms, and finally - if the evidence against them is sufficient - detained at indefinite pleasure of the King, until such as time as he sees fit to hold court and cast judgement. That the Pharoah is apparently unaware of the number of guests he is entertaining at the new high-security island gaol of Mestriocal is a feature, not a bug.
Where previously new ideas and freedom of commerce has sparked the beginnings of a promising golden age for the realm. Now discussion of new ideas and public dissent has been quietly and insidiously choked out, and people are no longer free to come and go. True art is all but dead, as all remaining artists make use of CENT’s capabilities to produce endless reams of politically safe content to keep the populace entertained but unthinking.
However, a handful of intellectuals and nobles see the looming threat of Ajax on the horizon and despair at their Pharoah’s apparent disinterest. After their political leader, the Human Heritep Ahlivia of Shol and Nabressen (whose parents fled Omund), was restricted to house arrest, their suspicions finally turned upon CENT at first as a mere instrument of surveillance, and then as the mastermind behind the throne itself. Now, they seek a seek a way to break CENT’s hold over the Pharoah and the realm, and either force the Pharoah to act, or enthrone one who will.
They call themselves: The Iris.
The Party are members or agents of The Iris who receive instructions from Ahlivia to meet at Iseret’s Bathhouse, a brothel frequented by those seeking clandestine pleasures and business dealings. Iseret is a member of The Iris, and a friend of Ahlivia, and makes her establishment available to facilitate private conversations. She has contacts with many important people in the City can can facilitate introductions if needed.
Iseret delivers intelligence and orders from Ahlivia: Ajax’s forces have infiltrated the Kingdom and time is running out to prepare for war. The Pharoah must be made to put the Realm on a war footing, or an alternative leader must act. Four pieces of intelligence present opportunities for The Iris to advance its objectives: