The High Kingdom was not founded as an empire. It emerged from pacts between rival houses, rising cults, and armies without a unified command. But after generations of war, it learned to hold power as only an empire can: through structure.

The Assembly of Electors distributes authority among major kingdoms, high prelacies, and the guardians of arcane regulation. The Väelthain does not rule from a capital. He arbitrates from his own territory, backed by intersecting oaths and the constant threat of collapse.

Civil wars, the failed campaign against Neverra, and the spread of Serens’ doctrine did not break the system. They refined it. Legitimacy is no longer inherited. It is demonstrated. Discipline has replaced blood. Procedure, lineage.

Today, the High Kingdom maintains its internal divisions, but it already operates with the logic of a single body. It has not declared the empire.

It enacts it.