Salbâth Insurgency

The Salbâth Insurgency came about after the Khazarkar Empire conquered Gilraen in 1421. There new masters forbade the worship of any god but Set. This Pharzîmrâth ruling was a religious decree enacted by Imruk Sapthiladân, the Khazarkar Empire's reigning Setarch.

Those in Gilraen, now a Khazarkar vassal sate, that didn't want to submit to the empire's one religion, and pledge allegiance to their new masters, went east into the Salbâth valley. They survived by banditry and secret help from the Eldritch Conclave. This help was the first sign that the empire's old enemy was tooling to fight them again (c.f. Eldritch Civil War).

For decades, the Kriavfahliil of Salbâth, once city-dwellers of Erchinor, proud worshipers of Arcana, lived like bandits, raiding an occasional convoy or waylaying travelers. The Khazarkar Empire would then ride off to punish them. These were hazardous missions because the beauty of the place from afar is far different down below, it is a rugged terrain cut with streams and sharp hills with the possibly of a predator on the other side, then there are poisonous gas vents, which are near invisible, and countless places to hide from a stalker or prepare an ambush. Kriavian elves in Khazarkar cities say their "fugitive" brothers in Salbâth have regressed to the state of wood elves.

The Khazarkar Empire has tried to build outposts and forts in Salbâth, but they never last. They all eventually fall to what four centuries ago were several thousand outlaws, but today number closer to 30,000, or perhaps even double that. They dwell in mountain redoubts or among subsurface labyrinths that function as small towns or bastions. Most of them still worship the Goddess of Arcane.