Flohelme
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Flohelme, officially known as the United Townships of Flone, is a union of settlements located on Flone, the largest island of the West Preludes. The nation is characterized by its decentralized governance, where each township maintains significant autonomy, while a central council oversees matters related to the military, economy, and diplomacy. Its largest settlement, Smule, serves as the de facto capital, housing the central administration and acting as the cultural and economic hub.
Flohelme’s economy is primarily driven by its extensive mining and metalworking industries, benefiting from the island’s rich deposits of unique metals found in Flone’s mountainous regions. Other significant economic activities include fishing and shipbuilding, which have been vital to the nation’s survival and prosperity.
History
Tribal cultures
Flone’s story begins in the Warm Age, when the first Somani tribes journeyed northwest across the Preludean landmass and settled along its wooded shores. Back then, Flone was still part of the mainland, its rolling hills cloaked in ancient oak and pine forests. The Somani, known for their masterful woodworking, built their lives around the island’s rich timber, shaping not only homes and ships but also a culture deeply tied to craftsmanship. Small communities sprang up around the best groves and natural resources, laying the groundwork for the cooperative spirit that would come to define Flohelme.
Everything changed with the great floods that brought the Warm Age to an end, cutting Flone off from the mainland and turning it into an island adrift in the Preludes. Life grew harder in isolation — trade routes for vital goods like fertilizers and tools were severed, harvests dwindled, and the northern stillwinds swept in, forcing entire villages to seek refuge in the warmer south. Though the southern settlements endured thanks to these migrations, the communities in the northern part of the island faded away. By the close of the Dawn Ages, only a handful of hardy fishing villages remained along Flone’s windswept coasts — quiet embers of a once-thriving land, waiting to be rekindled.
Colonization
For much of its early documented history, Flone remained on the edges of regional affairs — its harsh winds and scarce farmland keeping ambitious powers at bay. Even the rising Dotlands, seeking a foothold between their homeland and the distant Keeks Islands, struggled to tame Flone’s rugged coasts. Time and again during the Second Era, Dottish expeditions tried to establish a layover port, only to be defeated by treacherous weather and costly setbacks.
Yet Flone’s fortunes would soon change. After a rescue operation for Exnelibur, a Dottish trade ship, the rescued sailors came back with mentions of rare metals hiding beneath Flone’s craggy hills — a discovery that caught the eye of the Dottish Crown. Driven by the promise of wealth, the Dotlands redoubled their efforts, setting the stage for a more determined push to claim the island’s hidden bounty.
The Dotlands’ renewed push to colonize Flone found its first success in the founding of a colony in the area of modern Smule — a small settlement tucked into a sprawling valley between Flone’s jagged mountain ranges, where the fierce winds were gentler. Silver and iron mines soon opened in the hills south of town, drawing in waves of Dottish workers eager for tough but well-paid labor. In the early days, most of the collected ore was shipped back to the Dotlands, but that changed as refineries and metalworking stations rose up alongside the mines. These new industries didn’t just boost profits — they powered the growing town with heat and steam, turning Smule into a hub of life and innovation.
As the colony flourished, the Dotlands began hiring skilled foreign workers, including dwarven engineers renowned for their mastery of metalcraft. The success of Smule’s mines sparked a boom, with three more mining towns springing up across Flone, each tapping into the island’s deep veins of rare metals — the very heart of Flohelme’s future prosperity.
Fight for independence
For a time, Flone’s mines brought great wealth — but mostly for the distant Dotlands. As the years passed, the colonies’ supply lines grew costly, and the Dottish Crown sought to squeeze profits wherever it could. Wages stagnated, skilled workers left in search of better lives, and once-thriving towns slipped into poverty. It became clear to those who toiled beneath the mountains that their lives were little more than a means to fuel the wealth of the homeland — their own hopes and well-being sacrificed for distant prosperity.
Frustration simmered into open unrest. The mining towns, bound together by hardship, found strength in unity. They sent envoys across the sea to demand better pay, safer conditions, and a future where their labor served their own communities as much as the Crown. But the Dotlands answered with iron and spite — arresting the envoys and branding them traitors.
When the news of this broke to the residents of Flone a few days later, all non-essential work halted to a stop. For the following three days, Flone became essentially dormant in a silent protest against their perceived mistreatment and disregard by the Crown. In a national announcement, the Dottish government responded by declaring Flone to be under the control of armed insurgents, with claims of uncontrolled violence and riots rampant in the streets. A considerable effort was made to discredit and downplay the situation in the eyes of foreign powers, in order to dissuade them from making any attempt to interfere in the situation. In effect, the Crown was trying their best to isolate Flone, while massing up their armed forces to force a switch of administration in the colonies.
Beginning of the war
Most sources date the beginning of the Separation War to the official independence declaration made by Flone’s small administrative council under emergency. The first order of the freshly made state of Flohelme was to establish martial law, with orders to repurpose most of metalwork facilities to produce guns, ammo and other war supplies based on the Dottish weapon designs they had available in the colonies.
Flohelme caught on early that the Crown was attempting to separate them from the rest of the outside world. This convinced Flohelme to make an attempt to reach out to Sevoa, the main adversary of Dotlands that had shown interest in conducting business in the colonies before. Sevoa, who had by protocol elevated their naval readiness in response to the news from the Dottish government, had no overview of the situation on the island. After their first diplomatic talks, Sevoa agreed only to send over informants whose job became to gather intelligence on Flohelme’s circumstances and assess whether Sevoa’s intervention into the conflict would in any way be beneficial.
Meanwhile, the Crown was already moving onto the offensive. On the fourth week after Flohelme’s independence was signed, Dottish forces attempted a naval landing at Kalmlin, one of Flone’s eastern ports, but were thwarted by the local garrison that had prepared explosives to destroy the port infrastructure only the night before. Dottish ships finally managed a landing the day after in Lodel, where the local unorganized militia was both uninformed of enemy presence and too inexperienced to resist.
Following the coast to utilize the support of their navy, Dottish forces captured the entire eastern coast over the next week and a half. First sign of a halt in their offensive momentum came during their move inland towards Smule, where the harsh weather conditions strained their offensive capabilities. Upon realizing they needed to wait for the navy to advance along the southern coast, they largely dug in to wait for a more opportune time to push further.
The Dottish navy managed to navigate the southern waters up until the strait of Kespool, where a small-manned, but well-equipped coastal battery held up their advance into the inner bay to advance on Smule. On land, Flohelme’s forces were unable to resupply their troops fast enough, causing them to fall back from their defensive positions, and Smule was set under siege soon after. Without naval support, Smule managed to hold an additional week, giving valuable time for diplomatic endeavours with Sevoa.
Sevoan involvement
Sevoa, who had gained sufficient intelligence regarding the state of the war, struck a deal with Flohelme’s emergency government, with promises of exclusive trade agreements for unique metals, ores and alloys. In exchange, Sevoa agreed to carry out a blockade between the West and East Preludes. The blockade was expedited as Smule was put under siege.
Sevoa’s naval operations created a strange state of affairs — no official war declaration was made by either side. The Dotlands were not interested in entering into conflict with Sevoa, while Sevoa were looking to secure their deal with as little expenditure as possible. Flohelme still benefitted from the limbo, as the Dottish were now less capable to manage connections between their mainland and their expeditionary force.
As both sides were now undersupplied, tactics and battle strategy prevailed as the determining factor for success. Having received additional training from Sevoan instructors, Flohelme’s army was slowly being restructured to more fit its size and fighting capabilities. Flohelme managed to break the siege on Smule and forced Dottish forces into retreat.
Two weeks later, Flohelme signed a ceasefire offer from the Dotlands, who wanted the last of their land forces retreated safely off the island. Peace and recognition of Flohelme’s independence was negotiated by Sevoa thereafter.
Independence
With Sevoan support, Flohelme transitioned into a stable and largely self-sufficient state. Diplomatic and economic ties were also strengthened with Kheffelin following its own separation from the Dotlands, allowing both nations to trade essential resources needed for economic growth, agricultural development, and infrastructure expansion.
The discovery of the New World first reached Flohelme through Sevoan backchannels; however, the significance of the new territory was initially underestimated. Conflicting reports from early explorers led the government to dismiss much of the information as exaggerated, delaying any immediate efforts to capitalize on the discovery. It wasn’t until later, when Sevoa requested the services of numerous Flonian material experts to help scout for natural resources, that Flohelme started to get a better picture of what those lands held in potential for the future.
Much of Flohelme’s interaction with the New World was done directly through Sevoa, who had already invested heavily into creating efficient transport routes to and from the archipelago. Flohelme created two settlements in areas negotiated with the Sevoans, which both became later instrumental in the defense of the southern continent during the Allwar.