Context.
Following the Vorodena Accord of 953, Cazia-Orod made rapid gains against Imperial Panarine, which prior losses had left nearly surrounded by separatist states. Officially, Iantigē, since renamed Xantic, remained a neutral polity, though Talenic sympathies saw Roscarthine merchants favor Cazia-Orod as a creditor. The Crown-Sasinthene state of Goentia was at no time more a lukewarm ally to Imperial Panarine than during this war, making substantial loans to Cazia-Orod as well as their embattled ally.
In 960, Jirair XIV Anadanech signed a ceasefire with Maro Sejdenec, ceding the Vorad riverlands up to the White River, 30 kilometers short of Panarine’s western wall. Nearly bankrupt, Anadanech also ceded Sechors to his Roscarthine debtors, while Goentia refused to make further loans. A strict regime of taxation and rationing was adopted in the heartland itself as a result.
Though reduced to its heartland territories and a few scant accessories, Imperial Panarine’s financial situation recovered substantially. In 978 Maro Sejdenec died, and his cousin, Xanos Sejdenec, was elected to the throne of Cazia-Orod. During the week-long interregnum, Anadanech broke the ceasefire and reclaimed territory up to Vorodena, but failed to deliver a fatal blow on Cazia. The emperor entrenched outside of the city, but his emplacements were swamped during the Battle of the Crossing, named so for the ford across the Vorad that guarded Imperial retreat. However, during the battle, Panarine lost four magi of the Imperial Cabal, and were forced to abandon the push.
By 1015, a sixty-year war of attrition had left the city of Panarine and its new emperor, Jirair XV Danech III, back in the position it held after 960. It faced a four-year siege from the southern side, while Oronar forces made sustained progress in a campaign across Gesena. In late 1018, Cazian forces breached from the south, quickly seizing the southern half of the city in an urban offensive. The defending forces detonated the canal bridges, effectively dividing the city in two, but still faced the approaching Oronar as the Cazians dug in.
By 1020, northern Panarine was encircled, concentrated on the critical water supply lines of the Vorad and Lake Panarine. In early 1021, the fatal blow came as urban warfare erupted in the fortified northern districts and approached the palace complex. By the time the Cazian-Oronar forces reached the palace, however, the Imperial family had fled the city, across Menovina for Voleize, which held pro-Imperial sentiments.
In the late spring of 1021, Sgt. Giulon Sergeōs of the Voleizene military identified a band of roving armsmen riding up through Menovina. They carried no colors, wore shoddy cloaks and broke into a ragged sprint upon sighting the Voleizenes in the predawn light. Fearing attack by marauders, long a problem in light of the war, Giulon gave a hasty order to fire. In all, the entire Jirair line ended there, and the brief skirmish was a massacre, save for Royal Guardsman Agmederan Zosteir, who survived with a wounded leg.
Outcome.
The inarguable end of an empire just over 900 years since inception, the killing of Jirair XV Danech III on Sgt. Giulon’s orders was thoroughly investigated by tribunal, and while he was stripped of rank and service, Giulon was cleared of wrongdoing as part of a policy of Voleizene neutrality and in light of intensifying bandit problems. This decision was incendiary, sparking a bloody civil war between neutral ‘Red’ and pro-Imperial ‘Gold’ Voleize. The city of Panarine was fully lost to Cazia-Orod and would remain so until the establishment of Gold Panarine out of Gold Voleize.