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Following the idea that, as Impelanta III herself did, no blood connections were needed for political legitimacy, the House of the Impeles was expulsed from Arsal when the last of their monarchs, Impelanta XI, claimed to descend from the founder of Impelanza. This is now broadly considered to be a pretext for the growing power the aristocrats linked to the Impeles had acquired for some time already.
The name for the following period was implemented by the Arsalic Commonweath historians; however, the current knowledge of the transition period between Impelanza and this era makes it clear that it was a continuation of the process of political independence from the Arsalian power that had started when the Arsalian rulers had stopped enforcing any loyalty to the Impeles, other than religiously wise. The Arsalian Alliance lasted for three more centuries, but the relevance of what formerly was Impelanza's capital was limited. Arsal, being in Peragen Exterior and lacking any territorial connection to the continent, was left as a ceremonial site for the rest of monarchies, who kept on following the Tunseist religion but refused to give Arsal any political power over them. The territories that stood loyal to the Arsalian political power were from then limited to the very surroundings of the ancient metropolis.
In continental Peragen, the realm of Conoso was well located near to the coastal centres and Intergua. Trade flowed through it, and the access to the Interguan resources made the monarchy prosperous. The Conosian Games were founded in response to the Aldanics, and after them came other as the Lespanzan Games or the Mernian Games. It must be noted that these countries did not cease to participate in the Aldanics despite the appearance of new games, but it reflected how other rulers now had the influence enough to organise their own events in parallel while Arsal's power was now a symbol of what it used to be. Thanks to its prosperity, the realm gained in military force and expanded its territory until controlling important cities such as Pelda, Segata, Portóculo, Tolcázar or Orita, as well as all the lowlands delimited by the borders with the Erranzan sphere, the Peragen River and Intergua. Conoso's largest extension happened in the 7th century AD, and could only stop after its repeated and failed attempts to enter the Interguan and Erranzan states, since the Conosian tactics were only effective inland. Even when the realm would loose territories progressively until disappearing in the 10th century, the peak cultural period happened during the next two centuries, with the flourishing of the literary genre of the novel, derived from the previous century's philosophical trends and many times serving as mythical allegories to them.
=== The Nordian Empire and the return of the Impeles ===
Conoso's state, together with the Elvish states located in current day Wed Shams, north and west of Rodenia, as well as the eastern Peragian Sea coast, large portions of Intergua, and northern Erranza and Lespanza, would fall under the rule of the Lewizi kings Nordin V, who died during the siege of Marga, and Nordin VI, who marched forward from their original territories in the sources of the river Shams after two years of locust plagues, as reported from the historians of the time and later evidences. The fragmentation southern Arcturia had experienced for long centuries, plus the agricultural crisis lasting since the Toré eruption and the consequent general reduction of the military forces left an easy path for the strengthened Lewizi realm to expand across the Peragian region with a small but tactically effective force in the span of 10 years, with the last moves made in the year 960, the year when Nordin VI died of what is currently believed to be acute diabetes.
[[File:Nordian Empire map.jpg|600px|thumb|center|alt=A hand-made blank map of the Arcturian areas surrounding modern day Peragen, in which the peak territory of the Nordian Empire is marked by red stripes, the Nordian puppet states by black stripes, and the original territory of the Lewizi is circled by a green line. The three puppet states of the Nordians are Stena, to the southwest; Albon, to the east, in modern-day Rodenia; and Puntal, to the northeast, in modern-day Puntalia.A five-pointed star marks the location of the Empire's capital, Conoso.|The Nordian Empire at its peak territorial extent, during queen Altash's reign. Puppet states are marked in black, while the territory ruled by the Lewizi before their expansion is marked in green]]
Nordin VI's successor, Altash, would move to Conoso and establish there the empire's capital permanently; in the process, she also adopted Tunseism, abandoning the previous Nefisi beliefs Lewizi monarchs had followed, and built stronger ideological ties with Impelanza, such as the expansion on the section of Impelanta's story in which she stays with the Elvish peoples in the area east to the Peragian Sea. Those peoples, sworn to Impelanta, were described as being ancestors of the Lewizi, and Altash and her successors claimed the Arsalian title of Guardians of Her Legacy. Altash's reign would last 102 years, a long span among elven queens.
The Nordian empire would last in the boundaries Nordin VI defined until Altash's successor, Tunsayehu. By his 46th year of reign (1108), the inner tensions inside the Lewizi elites, which confronted supporters and detractors of the "impelanzation" the empire was undergoing not only in the ideological field, but also around the economical and administration aspects (in which Altash was inspired as a model of efficiency), made the empire split in half. Tunsayehu's forced abdication and the subsequent inner Lewizi war left the Peragen river as border between the two newly formed realms, which would follow different trends from that moment.
On the one hand, Tunsayehu's aunt, Tsanainesh, kept the control of Conoso, Intergua, the southern Peragian areas and the puppet state of Stena (modern day Estenes); on the other, Inidiswa, governor of Yamalikiti (modern day Tiziri) and member of Tunsayehu's court, crossed the Peragen and successfully sieged Portóculo with the support of the Albon and Puntal as allies, only for Tsanainesh's forces to take control of the city only a month later. With no side being able to cross the Peragen river, the Conosian and Yamalikitin empires signed the Treaty on Both Banks, which established both empires as independent entities from each other, setting the lower Peragen valley as common border, and as legitimate successors of the Nordian empire, as well as acknowledging each empire's rulers as Guardians of Her Legacy.
Three centuries earlier, in Peragen Exterior, the Arsalian Alliance had come ''de facto'' to an end in 870, when the Arsalian Council appointed a monarch for the first time in three hundred years: Peragente VI was enthroned both as Regent Chancellor of the Arsalians and King of Arsal. The Regent Chancellorship, until then a temporary office, would be held by Peragente for a lifetime. Peragente's successor, Aluciela II, first named her own succession line as heir to the Impeles, and then included Peragente, herself and her royal family as part of the House of the Impeles. The move caused inner tensions in the Arsalian aristocracy, but was carried successfully after Aluciela wrote the ambiguous Decree on the Return of the Impeles in her capacity as Regent Chancellor: by this decree, the return of the Impelanzan royal house adopted a symbolic role, legitimising the new monarchical figures, but monarchs would still need to be elected in the same way they had been under the Arsalian Alliance.
During the Nordian period, Arsal would turn for the Empire into a frequent trade partner and ally: these ties helped its power increase in the Outer Lands, over which Arsal could pursue higher influence levels than with Nordian Peragen. The Arsalian aristocracy arranged partnerships with different states in Peragen Exterior and the Outer Lands, such as Sulcino or Cartena: after the Sulcinian archon Jarante joined the Arsalian Council in the year 1265, the entirety of the Outer Lands were ruled by Arsal or by its puppet states and the strong bindings they had with the Arsalian Council. Jarante was elected Regent Chancellor in 1278, and two years later they decreed to be, as holder of the Arsalian throne and head of the Impeles, the only legitimate Guardian of Her Legacy. For the first time in four centuries, a non-Lewizi state had gained enough power to dispute the role the Nordian states held in the region.
For the Yamalikitin state, this meant an intolerable offense to the role Nordian monarchs had adopted long ago, and invited Conoso to join retaliation efforts against Arsal. However, this supposed not just a threat to Conoso, but also an opportunity: Jarante's decree moved the Conosian court to follow what has been understood by historiography as a geopolitical stategy. In 1294 the Conosian monarch, Jáiluda, instead of joining the Yamalikitin claims, reached an agreement with Arsal, by which, in order to strengthen Arsal's role as as sole overseer of all Tunseist affairs, the Conosian Lewizi would resign from any claims to the Guardianship of Her Legacy and would send the first in the succession line, Amharque, to become part of the Impeles in the Arsalian court. Amharque was elected King of Arsal a decade later, in 1304, and rose to the Conosian throne in 1307. The Arsalian and Conosian states, together with their puppet territories, had been unified under the same ruler, in what would be called the Commonwealth of Arsal.
=== The Commonwealth of Arsal ===
== Symbols ==
The flag of the Impelanzan Union describes four colours divided in horizontal areas: from top to bottom, orange, white, golden, and turquoise. Their disposition suggests both a sunrise and a sunset, with the orange skies above and the blue seas below. In the middle of both, Impelanta's Star shines in a luminous white. A line of orange and blue is inserted into each other's area.
The flag has been described in multiple ways, with two relevant versions: by the first one, the sunrise and sunset represent the access of the Impelanzan sphere to both seas surrounding Arcturia; by the second one, it is the beginning and end of existence, and how Impelanta's myth enlightens and guides the span between birth and death. Orange and blue mingle with each other, in the Tunseist conception that in the nature of Urth there is no end without a beginning and no beginning without an end, and both succeed each other in Tunsé's Eternity.
[[category:Urth]]
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