Following the conquest of the Columbia basin from the Mormons of Deseret, the Buddhist merchant-republics of the Pacific Northwest, who briefly put aside their squabbles to take down the Mormons of Columbia, now found themselves bickering over who got what land, whether it would be opened to settlement, and various other minutiae. To avoid conflict, it was decided the land would be given to a neutral third party who would protect all Cascadians: the Columbian Order, the Zen order of swordsmen that had done so much in the crusade against the Desereti, who did not respect nature and the order of things.
The Columbian Order was not at all prepared to govern the whole of the Columbia basin.
It was a simple monastic order. Prior to the Crusade, its ranks had never swelled above a few thousand. Now, it had to deal with tens of thousands, half of which were barely civilized convert barbarians. The Order was a disorganized mess, the Shogun not having the means to exercise anything regarding order across the breadth of the land under his control, from Boise to The Dallis.
Radical reforms were needed, and the fact that most of the "old guard" so to speak . In the years leading up to the final crushing victory at Boise, extreme reorganization of the Order took place. A young new Shogun, Adam Lang, was the man for the job. Lang was a local convert to Buddhism, and a fervent one at that. He'd proven himself skilled at the katana, and even more vicious than a born-and-bred Cascadian when it came to implementing carbon-neutral living, and when the old shogun died, he was quickly picked by the Masters of the order, seen as a natural fit to adapt the Order to the needs of its many new adherents.
One of his first and most radical changes was to remove the vow of chastity. The vow of chastity was a bit of an anomaly in the first place- when the Order was established, no other Buddhist monastic order allowed vows of chastity. The priestly tradition came from priests wandering from town to town playing rock and roll, for christ sakes. The reason it had been implemented by the Jedi was twofold: first, because particular to their brand was Zen Buddhism (specifically, what they gleaned from water-logged copies of "Zen in the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance"), and secondly, being one of the first military orders, they didn't want to threaten the established city governments. Now, they were the government.
The structure itself was reformed as well. Now, the Jedi Masters, previously ascetic monks and occasional warriors, would be put in charge of a local "Stake", a term co-opted from the Mormons, and at his command would be Jedi Knights, sworn to the Order first and their local Master second. The new Masters would be appointed by the Shogun upon their death. The Shogun himself would be elected from the Masters. The Shogun's scope of direct control would be severely limited, with the Masters handling most of the day-to-day operations. The Shogun would be more of a "big picture" guy, focusing on expansion of Columbia, with the Masters funneling tithes up to him to help the Holy Mission, and being called on for their warriors.
These reforms were implemented following the Battle of Boise and the Olympic Congress's declaration that the Columbian Order would be suzerain over the new territory. They had not expected Lang to be so bold, and he was denounced within a month of his announcement. In retaliation, Lang invaded and conquered the whole of Cascadia.
It was the first time anyone had ever invaded the rugged and insular country of Cascadia and won. The reasons for this were manifold: first, and most obviously, the Cascadians were not expecting it. By the time they were in the Willamette Valley, it was too late. But secondly, and more importantly, the Columbian force was one of the most experienced in the history of the region, combining centuries of cumulative martial training and philosophy with the real world knowledge gained from war with the Deserti. Most Cascadian Militiamen had never been presented with the sorts of heavy infantry tactics that the Columbians were whipping out. And the third pivotal factor was that most of the Jedi orders sided with the Columbians, turning over the cities to Lang when he and his men arrived. Creating the District of Salish and the District of Oregon, Lang commissioned a fleet, and sailed for California.
Confederations of Northwesten city-states had taken Alcatraz in the past to control trade into the Californias, but Lang wanted to go one step further, and conquer California itself, and build the greatest empire since the United States. Unfortunately for him, he and his mad dream died when a massive storm hit his fleet. He was succeeded by his son, Adam Junior. Adam II was much more pragmatic, retreated and attempted to maintain his holdings in Cascadia. He did not succeed.
In the course of a decade, the grand "Columbian Empire", which had perhaps the best shot at re-uniting Western America before or since, was reduced to its backwater holdings. Even worse was the return of the Deserti a century later, who would push them even further up the Snake River. The Jedi Orders were disbanded in Cascadia. Some were added to secular militaries, but most were either executed, or forced into hiding. Within 30 years, the Jedi were semi-mythical in Cascadia, seen by the public as champions of the people against the burghers of the cities, occasionally emerging from their hiding when there was a great disturbance in the force...
Columbia itself has devolved from a Monastic Order into a feudal despotism. Both the Masterships and the Shogunate have become largely hereditary, with occasional shake ups to traditional lineages being very much the exception. It is a heavily stratified society: a good percentage of the population are land-holding Jedi Knights and Jedi Masters, while another portion are free land holding peasants, converts and Cascadians, who pay taxes to their local masters. The other half of the population consists of Mormon serfs, who are essentially salves, who live in constant fear of the horse's trod. The situation is very much like that of the Helots of Ancient Sparta. A full time warrior class spends its time and makes its living killing and pillaging among the Mormons. The high numbers of Mormons make the Cascadian position on the totem pole precarious, however: were Deseret to invade, they would have thousands of oppressed peoples on their side.
The primary industry of Columbia is farming. In the wide-open space of the Columbia basin, most of which is not dominated by hard-to-clear (by self imposed regulation) woodland and mountains like the rest of the Pacific Northwest, massive sprawling plantation-style farms can exist. Irrigated by the Columbia, Snake and their tributaries, Columbia is the breadbasket of Cascadia and Deseret.
A significant amount of the industry also comes from animal husbandry. The raising of cows is strictly regulated in Cascadia. Needing a tremendous amount of land for pasture, and producing harmful methane gas, milk, leather, and beef are vastly more expensive than they ought to be. Pasture is no problem in Columbia, making it the furthest west center of the cattle industry, and is the only major center outside of the Great Plains. Because of this, Deseret, California and Cascadia are able to get away without dealing with the Cowboy cattle-barons unlike the Eastrons. The finest horses in the region are also bred in Columbia, courtesy of the tradition of their mounted Jedi.
The other primary industry is trade. The Snake and Columbia are still vital in tying together Cascadia and Deseret, one of the most important arteries of trade in America outside of the Mississippi. A hefty tax is collected at Kenwik, where the representatives of the merchant companies buy up goods from Desereti traders in great markets, overlooked by armored Columbians.
There are few major cities in Columbia, none of them exceeding 25,000. There is The Dallis, traditional center of the Columbian Order, gateway to the west, and the site of the largest fort in Columbia. Built over the original Jedi Temple, these breathtaking fortifications are both designed to defend from any Portlandian treachery, and as a launching point for any future Cascadian invasion. Kenwik is the official capital, home to the Shogun's Castle, and the primary center of trade, sitting at the confluence of the Snake and Columbia. The third is Spokane, the new center of the Columbian Jedi temple. just as The Dallis was once on the precipice of a vast and unknown wilderness where Knights could wander and train, so too does Spokane, sitting on the edge of the Idahoan wilderness, where they may fight and convert the Mormon Hilljacks, and achieve something resembling enlightenment among the endless wilds of mother nature.
The bulk of the population is distributed among villages and farmsteads, with the local "centers" being the 30 Great Keeps of the 30 Masters. It is from here that local Masters command their Jedi, shelter the peasantry in bad times, and terrorize the Helots in good.
Despite its war-like ways and the abject slavery it holds half of its population in, the District of Columbia is looked upon with wonderment by the people of the Northwest. The less scrupulous guitar-priests and druids write songs of the noble Jedi, their fights with the Sasquatch, their endless defense against the Cowboy/ Mormon/ Cyclops hordes (their sense of geography is fuzzy at best). Tales of the "Masterless Jedi" are just as popular, those who dare strike out against tyrannical black-armored Shoguns (or the burghers of Cascadia). Columbia is the "Gateway to the East", a land of nobility that may one day ride all the way to fabled Washington, DC. A land of plenty, where many bright-eyed colonists trek to to this day.
The Columbian Nobility has a less positive view. The Masters grow impatient with their holdings, lusting after more and more resources, demanding more keeps to station their third and fourth sons and daughters. The Shogun of Columbia, Cobain III Lang, hears their cries, and he has a plan. Ethnically Mormon Hilljack converts slip undetected through the lands of Deseret, whispering in the ears of humiliated Wyoming chieftains. Unassuming Buddhist traders sail north to Ankrage, bringing gold to the local pirate-lords, telling them tales of a complacent and decadent Cascadia. Katanas are being forged in The Dallis, and all across Cascadia, the men and women in hiding feel something. A call to arms. A disturbance in the force...
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This map was made for the
Medieval America Mark III project, a really awesome collaborative that you should all take a look at.
But, moreover, this is one of my first real maps. Any advice or thoughts?
