And victory goes to:
1) PURGE THE UNCLEAN!
====================
To purge the Eldritch is to cross the thin edge of a razor.
Chaos Rising Theme 4
Alf Bolt looked upon the altar of Týr. Making the right choice of not succumbing to despair and damnation was not easy, and much hardship would certainly happen until the foe is hunted down from their hiding holes and completely purged through all these years until 1663. Their gods are far from quiet when their worshippers are being persecuted, thus, he asked for courage and strength, because he would have to rule the Republic through what inevitably will become one of Vinland's most turbulent and chaotic times. The question that was most feared is how will the Great Old Ones retaliate, and when.
Note: Because of bugs with the counting of religious minorities due to a too small change in such values of the purges, I doubled both the "We need to find them first" timer and the effect every time it ends and a load of cultists meets the *BLAM* for the only thing considered HERESY! with allcaps in Vinland.
Doomsayers were aplenty claiming Ragnarök draws near when the first attacks happened, not so long after the purges against the cultists began. Entire isolated villages were wiped out, and when a force was gathered to put an end to it, such force had no chance and was almost completely slaughtered. Worse, that was only the beginning of constant attacks against all Vinland coastal territories.
Note: Those manpower gains to simulate those who made it through are the best way to handle it. Although it means free manpower if the country affected by the event is depleted of it, that is far from the worst case scenario here. Not doing anything when that event fires causes -1 stability and a greater loss of prestige. And I forgot that giving manpower values lower than 1 in events give manpower based on max manpower, but I fixed that now through a workaround, so a few hundreds actually will be a few hundreds.
But not always the Deep Ones won, except the few victories were very difficult and costly, but sufficient to, at least in those regions, put an end to the wave of attacks terrorizing the entire country, reaching as far as into the African colonies.
Now, there was no more turning back. Alf Bolt was determined to not be intimidated, inspired by the example of the legendary Angartýr, as he fought against such inhuman threats.
Finally, several cultists were hunted down and exterminated, but there were still many of them left, too many of them disguised within the veneer of civilization, pretending to worship Norse gods or even the Christian god but secretly singing praises to Cthulhu, and the Deep Ones would not go quiet any time soon.
Maybe some of them were not Cthulhu worshippers, but considering the threat they represent to every single citizen of Vinland and to mankind, that is not a big deal.
Their vengeance for the first great slaughter of Eldritch Cultists left an enormous trail of blood all accross the island of Vinland, with four thousand soldiers ambushed and slaughtered by a legion of Deep Ones. It was not just a tragedy, it was a complete disaster, and together with the nightmares almost everyone was having, it brough enormous chaos to the country.
NOTE: The "Deep Ones Attack" event is intended to make you wish for Barbary Pirates instead. As shown before, it is a choice between losing 1 point of stability or betting with manpower between a 30% risk of losing twice in stability, a 40% chance of losing a battle but still preventing a stability hit at the expense of manpower and prestige, a 24% chance of a more positive outcome that will spare that province from other Deep Ones attacks for a while and give stability cost and revolt risk bonuses, a 5% chance of an even better outcome with even longer immunity to those attacks or a 1% chance of a truly great outcome that will stop attacks on the province for the entire length of the purge. I have set it up to happen less often the more coastal cities the player owns: twice less often if you own 2, Four times less if you own 4 coastal provinces, up to 16 times less if you 16, and no more than that, which still is quite generous considering the base MTTH is 10 years, except that is Mean Time to Happen and not a timer, so if you have a huge blob with several dozens of coastal provinces by the time you do that exterminate eldritch cultist decision, it will be as much of a rape as you'll see in this update, because the RNG likes to hate me and I was not save-scumming. A country suffering from lack of stability for pissing off Cthulhu and the likes makes complete sense, if you think about it, and I think this is a much better way to simulate this than spawning ridiculous doomstacks of religious rebels.
Meanwhile, once again Granada loses, but Portugal simply did not seize any of their Brazilian colonies while they could.
To help the people overcome the chaos and despair, let them have a better life and a better economy. Inspired by the ideals of Adam Smith before he was even born, and even more by the way things worked in Iceland back when it had no kings ruling over it, the rise of the lolbertarian policies regarding taxation came, ensuring greater stability and lessened tensions all accross Vinland as the people could distract themselves more from the horrors of the Great Old Ones thanks to the tax cuts.
tl;dr Rǫgn Páll Revolution Gold Standard for a better Vinland
Long story made short, the last remnant of Nordland, having no chance on their own, voluntarily accepted to become a protectorate of Sweden, but they rebelled against their Swedish overlords. Vinland answered the call to arms, but they would not help Sweden with this war they can easily win by themselves. Specially now.
When Alf Bolt died, many in the Althing questioned his decision, not because it was morally wrong, but because of how its consequences were heavy burdens until at last the taint of Eldritch cults was almost completely purged from the land. Olav Norheim on the other hand had no reservations about proceeding with the extermination of the chimeras and abominations, instead, he was even more zealous in his desire of wiping out all of them from this land, for his parents were slaughtered not so long ago by an attack of the Deep Ones.
Some skraelings are too savage to deserve any respect. They raided without provocation in the past, and so they shall do it again. Their lands in one of the notorious "Pirate Islands" of Vinland shall be covered in tobacco!
Just when the worst of the storm of chaos and instability appeared to be ending as the Republic dedicated almost all of their resources to restore order in the land... this happened.
And shortly after it continued. Not only in that place. It was a time of chaos and despair that seemed to never end. Vinland had to overcome it, but it wouldn't be easy.
To make things worse, in the year of 1650, the long distance of Vinland to their potential Christian enemies in Europe was over. Over the southern straits, English ships arrived and began to colonize the south of Vinland.
This would be the worst possible time for a war with the worst Saxon. Another sighting of the terrible high priest of the Elder Gods, a god by itself, the beings it worships must be terrible beyond any comprehension.
With the arrival of England, it is clear Vinland will need a powerful Navy to ensure their continued sovereignty over the New World. Thus, an even greater naval focus is sought, for their army will always be relatively small but highly trained and capable.
Another legendary capture of a treasure ship in the year of 1651 was truly needed. Vinland almost completely halted all their colonization programs due to the immense crisis the retaliation of the Great Old Ones against the extermination of their cultists brought. That gold could fund key colonial projects such as seizing the Bahamas before the English do.
A noble gesture in a time of difficulty, Vinland always was a haven for all pagans, and now this didn't change. The more primitive forms of worship to gods would find a safe haven in Vinland, just as the "last" three Norses of Iceland did over six hundred years ago.
Vinland stood defiant to the retaliation of the horrors, and finally, after many years of extermination, territories once completely dominated by the horrors were no more their domain, and they were reduced to a less powerful and threatening minority. No more those lands were grounds of undisputed worship to the Great Old Ones, and in time, the Norse Faith would prevail all across the lands conquered from the Dagonl'nu.
Having failed in the race for the southern portions of Vinland, the foolish Welsh began to settle the frozen north of Vinland instead in search of wealth. Fortunately, they were far less belligerent than their Anglo-Saxon neighbors, and once they realized what they will have as neighbors in the New World other than Vinland, they will think twice before trying to do anything against the Republic. Hopefully they won't end unleashing Prisoners of Ice or something. With this, the precarious situation of Vinland needed to improve, lest they advance inland from the far north and colonize most of the continent inner lands not occupied by civilized natives first than Vinland.
A new legend arises in these dark times. The next Leif Ericsson is intent on trying to chart a route to the Indies from the west, past the Strait of Tollak near the South Pole, to whom he shares the same first name. Tollak Olavsson fearless goes forth in a frigate to chart the unkown southern Pacific.
A few survivors returned, but Tollak Olavsson never made it back. According to the survivors, he was drawn by a strange island with bizarre geometric shapes he spotted very far away near the island of the Fiji people, while the survivors were so frightened about it, specially from being well aware of the Dagonl'nu and how it reminisced them about their horrors, that they deserted his ship. Most died in the journey back, but the few who made it through reported the discoveries. Unfortunately those islands are way too far away to be colonized with current ship designs.
Tollak Olavsson was never heard of again, and his final fate will be forever unknown, but his bold exploration will be remembered.
It sort of happened like this, but with the enemies having less horns and more tentacles
Olav Norheim's zealousness to purge the unclean proved to become his own demise, as his death was verily desired by the horrors and their worshippers. In one opportune moment, the worst of their chimeras and horrors surrounded his escort as he was travelling, and rather than die in infamy as a coward, he has chosen the honorable path of fighting to the death. He obviously didn't make it, but his name and bravery will never be forgotten.
His son Simon Olavsson was elected as the new Consul. Rather than bow down and succumb to the fear of dying, he swore revenge for the death of his father, and personally led many hunting parties, and personally slaughtered many cultists of the Great Old Ones. A fire raged in his eyes that couldn't completely hide his sorrow.
But, in 11th of September of 1656, a few months after he assumed the position of Consul, he died of a "natural causes" despite his relative youth. That was the official version on his death, for the truth was far more horrifying. His dead body was found bloated and violated, with swirling tentacles coming out of his nostrils, mouth, eye sockets and ass. What did such a horrible thing to him was something nobody aware of the truth about Simon Olavsson's death dared to think about. Even as the truth was not spread out, soon the superstition that being a Consul of Vinland was equal to being cursed arose within gossip.
And no, Jews had nothing to do with this September 11th.
Hopefully Folke Norheim will have enough time alive to make his overally excellent capabilities benefit Vinland in these dark times.
This was no time for having to fight dozens of thousands of malcontents as well as Eldritch horrors, and thus the government had no choice but to make compromises.
May the Great Old Ones eat them last! Damn English imperialists! They will be crushed if they dare and have all their colonies in the New World rightfully seized, for Vinland overcame enemies much mightier before, and so shall they overcome them!
Whispers began to arise on how the only way to truly crush the Eldritch menace also required something else. Whispers on how the Skraeling were naturally lured and born tempted, on how being so close to those things inevitably should have corrupted them long ago regardless of them following them as gods or not.
Whispers asking for only one thing:
Genocide.
After four years ruling Vinland, which was starting to look like the Roman Empire during its worst times from how short lasted the rules were being lately, the unfortunate Folke Norheim was likewise ambushed and killed by the horrors. Bravely, rather than run away and almost certainly die like a coward, he fought to the death.
The number of people willing to volunteer themselves as candidates for being Consul had a sharp drop lately, but fortunately there were still enough men both competent and courageous to assume this ever dangerous role. No matter how many security they had, the enemies they fought always a threat even to the most protected ruler. May Alf Bjelke survive these dark times.
Less than one year later...
At this point, "becoming an Consul" became an euphemism for comitting suicide. Yet, there were still men brave enough to risk their lives so much for Vinland.
But Einar Torgeirsson, like his predecessors, did not fear death. As long as Vinland makes it through and crushes most of the Eldritch cults, already fortunately utterly vanquished and annihilated within Smaragdur, Innu and Vinland, their sacrifices will not be in vain. May Einar live a little longer after becoming Consul than his predecessors did.
This darkest time was coming to an end. Although it was unlikely they would completely wipe out the Eldritch presence from their lands, their threat was greatly diminished now that they were no longer a majority in any province. As most now trusted just and honorable gods instead, the spread of their vile taint would be kept in check, but these events had a traumatic impact over Vinland, now determined to not even think about conquering the remaining Dagonl'nu lands. It was a harsh time, but in two years, at least, peace could slowly return again, and no more all who leave near the coast will have to fear for the worst terrors, no more mass suicides from sightings of Cthulhu idols and no more short-lasted Consuls... the storm of the Great Old Ones was ending, for now.
And fortunately, some stupid Granadans and their austerity antics were of no consequence within Vinland. A major economic crisis at this moment would be a death knell for the Republic that would take even more decades to be recovered from.
Yet, while the storm of the Great Old Ones was coming to an end, another foe saw in the terrible state of stability of Vinland an opportunity and a new storm was coming, a storm of colonial wars.
How dare they to defy those who overcame much worse threats in the past? Damn English and their Portuguese lackeys! Vinland has faced far worse before, and will prevail!
ODIN DEMANDS ANGLO-SAXON BLOOD AND
The Brazilian Slaughter ! VINLAND FOR VINLANDERS! DEATH TO ENGLAND!