The **Order of the Crimson Standard** is a knightly brotherhood charged by the King of Thalossa with expanding humanity’s reach beyond the Great Wall. Their crimson banners mark the edge of civilization, where soldiers and settlers forge roads, build forts, and raise villages against overwhelming odds. More than soldiers, they are pioneers, carving safe passage into the wilds. Their greatest foes are the towering trolls and apex predators that stalk the frontier, but they face equal danger from plague outbreaks and hostile forests.
- Founded **100 years ago**, at the dawn of the conquest into the wilds.
- Created by royal decree to secure the kingdom’s survival by claiming new lands and resources.
- The crimson banner symbolizes the blood shed in service to humanity’s future.
- **Lord-Captain of the Crimson Banner** – Chosen by the crown, supreme commander of the Order.
- **Bannerlords** – Regional leaders, each commanding a major fortress or stronghold.
- **Crimson Knights** – Veteran officers, skilled in both combat and frontier survival.
- **Standard-Bearers** – The backbone of the Order: knights, engineers, and settlers sworn to the banner.
- **Expansion as Survival** – Humanity must claim the wilds or die behind the walls.
- **Endurance and Sacrifice** – Frontier life is harsh, and no knight fears hardship or loss.
- **Civilization’s Spearhead** – Roads, forts, and settlements are as vital as swords and shields.
- **Beast-Slayers** – Trolls, wyverns, and wyrms are prime targets, hunted so villages may thrive.
- **Beyond the Wall** – Crimson forts and frontier villages dot the wilderness, linked by guarded roads.
- **Within the Kingdom** – Each major city holds a chapterhouse where recruits are trained and supplied.
- **Campaign Columns** – The Order marches in companies, with knights, settlers, and priests advancing together. The **Order of Last Light** sends recruits with these companies to consecrate the dead and prevent plague outbreaks, ensuring that settlements do not fall to corruption.
- **Crown of Thalossa** – Loyal vassals, entrusted with the survival of the realm.
- **Order of Last Light** – Essential allies; no campaign column marches without their presence, though the Crimson sometimes grows impatient with their caution.
- **Order of Dawn** – Mutual respect, though the Dawn views the Crimson’s frontier work as reckless.
- **Ashen Vigil** – Distrusted but tolerated; their scorched-earth methods sometimes save settlements, sometimes doom them.
- **Dragon Knights** – Revered; their purges make Crimson expansion possible by driving back the greatest beasts.
- **Mage Guild** – Partners in supplying wards, enchanted weapons, and runes for frontier defense.