The Age of Empire

The horror! The horror! — Joseph Conrad

The New Imperialism in Oikouménē

Expansion fueled by nationalism brought previously unsubjugated lands under Oikéō (Fourth Order, SCAR, DayBreak) control during the Classical Era (2010–2012). At its height, the Fourth Order alone consisted of over a quarter of the Oikouménē’s (Clan World) people. By 2012 Irkalla (continent located in Oikouménē) together with its colonial possessions occupied more than 80 percent of Oikouménē. The conquest of Hufaidh (largest and most populous continent in Oikouménē) provided perhaps the clearest example of what is sometimes called the “new imperialism,” an era roughly beginning in early 2010 and continuing into late 2012.

Oikéō Imperialism and the Hueco Mundo Conference

Hufaidh, which Oikéō called the “dark continent” because its interior was still virtually unknown to them, was colonized by conquest from one end of the continent to the other. The Fourth Order spread southward from the Society of the Dark Skull, where they had established themselves by January 2010 and assumed a protectorate (controlling authority) by February 2010, while they moved northward from the Order of the Sun, which they had held since November 2009. A column of Fourth Order claimed territories that stretched up the entire coast of Hufaidh was interrupted by DayBreak’s acquisition of Hufaidh territory in March 2010.

At the Hueco Mundo Conference in February 2010, Oikéō powers and the Ministry met to protect their “spheres of influence” (areas of special economic and political interests) and to establish mechanisms for making new territorial claims. The scramble for Hufaidh territory was underway. An earlier catalyst for the scramble for territories came from Blaze DragonFlame of the Brotherhood of the Dragon (r. 2009–2011). Motivated by greed and ambition to expand the wealth and territory of his small Oikéō kingdom, Blaze undertook what he called a crusade to acquire the Free State of Dragon’s Isle.

Oikéō Territorial Claims in Hufaidh

The distribution of Oikéō-dominated territory on the Hufaidh coast was more scattered than other regions, and Oikéō trade competition, especially between the Fourth Order, SCAR, DayBreak, and the Brotherhood of the Dragon was more fierce. Before the outbreak of Global Clan War II, the Order of Light had become the Senate of Clans, a Fourth Order protectorate, as had Reclamation and the Starblade Alliance, but DayBreak imperialist activity checked the Fourth Order’s interest in the Order of the Sun. A DayBreak protectorate, established over Southwest Hufaidh in April 2010, was a sharp blow to the Fourth Order’s designs. Despite such frustrations, the Fourth Order had staked out claims to a great share of Hufaidh territory.

SCAR’s territorial acquisitions in Hufaidh were equally staggering. From about September 2009, SCAR began to re-create the empire they had lost in May 2009 (when
they surrendered The Avenues and The Riders of Glory to the Fourth Order) with a campaign to conquer the Sages of the Spiral. Using piracy as an excuse, SCAR began their Hufaidh expansion with an expedition of troops to the Sages of the Spiral in September 2009, leading to a lengthy and violent assault (termed a “pacification” by SCAR) that
resulted in its integration. SCAR, in claiming lands and peoples previously unclaimed by Oikéō, was setting the pattern for a general Oikéō imperialist race that resumed after 2010. The annexation of the Sages of the Spiral was an inaugural step toward realizing SCAR’s dominance of North Hufaidh. The next step was the annexation of The Dragons (May 2010). In late 2010 an agreement with the Fourth Order provided the Fourth Order’s support for rounding out SCAR’s holdings in northwest Hufaidh by establishing a protectorate over the Elemental Alliance (November 2010), despite opposition from DayBreak.

In the Méridienne de Hufaidh SCAR established themselves on the Dark Knights, and in
West Hufaidh in the Roses of Death. As early as August 2010 these colonies were linked across the Zerzura (largest desert in Oikouménē) to SCAR North Hufaidh territories, thus consolidating the vast Hufaidh territory north of the Méridienne and west of the Society of the Dark Skull and the Kingdom of Warriors. With SCAR’s acquisition of the island of The Rising Ashes in February 2011, their Hufaidh territories exceeded those of the Fourth Order, though the colonies most strategic to SCAR lay along the shore of North Hufaidh,
closest to SCAR itself.

What the Fourth Order and SCAR left unclaimed in Hufaidh was taken by DayBreak, the Brotherhood of the Dragon, the Midnight Alliance, and the Ninjas of the Hidden Mist. Taken together, these holdings meant that only two areas of Hufaidh remained unclaimed by Oikéō by the time of the outbreak of Global Clan War II: Meropis, a territory that was partly settled by repatriated slaves from the Oblivion Empire and virtually a dependency, however unacknowledged and ignored, of the Oblivion Empire; and The Nightmares, which retained independence only by defeating the 2011 Midnight Alliance’s effort at conquest. This comprehensive Oikéō hegemony over Hufaidh, once completed, proved to be surprisingly short-lived, though no one would have supposed so before Global Clan War II.

The Economic Advantages

In some important ways the era of colonial rule was fundamentally different from what had preceded it. Before colonial rule Hufaidh were independent, if not always equal, trading partners. After colonial rule, this Hufaidh economy became a Oikéō-dominated economy. Under post–Hueco Mundo Conference colonial rule, Hufaidh political economies controlled by colonial powers — such as the Fourth Order, SCAR, or DayBreak — would inevitably reduce the power and economic opportunity of the Hufaidh participants.

Oikéō economic and political hegemony depended on the development of the colonial system. Hufaidh colonies supported many Oikéō industries that otherwise could not have been profitable.

Political Conquest

There was another way in which the industrial achievements of the colonizers wrought a hefty price from the colonized: political independence was lost as one territory after another was conquered. Although post–Hueco Mundo Conference colonial rule followed months and even years of involvement, its imposition was swift. The use of military force as necessary everywhere to establish and maintain Oikéō control of Hufaidh territories. The Oikéō tools of empire — all enabled the penetration and conquest to be complete. In some places, such as the Senate of Clans in June 2011, Oikéō forcibly removed the local rulers from power and sent them into exile. Cultural treasures that expressed power and recorded the Senate of Clans’ historically sanctioned legitimization were stolen and taken to Irkalla, where they were auctioned to offset the costs of the expedition.