Historica Arcanum - Empires of the Silk Road

The Silk Road of 13th Century

The Silk Road has been the heart of civilization for over two millennia.

Never in world history has humankind had such an important network (until perhaps the internet) that connected not only goods but also facilitated the exchange of ideas, religions, technologies, and cultures among the peoples of the world. With gold, silver, and silk flowing through the veins of the Road, merchants and philosophers - not warlords - were perhaps for the very first time the movers and shakers of society.

Yet with such importance, material wealth, and intellectual prosperity came envy and enmity. In the 13th century, when this book is set, the Silk Road is coveted by the rising and ruthless Khanate in the North, descending to the lands below under the Banner of the Eternal Blue Sky. To the West, the then-impoverished Western Crusader Kings have claimed swathes of lands and eye the East. Stuck in the middle of the collapsing worlds, the Sultanate desperately holds onto the throne of Persia - that they themselves took by force a few centuries ago.

Where power is fragmented, fear is a valuable currency, and the one who controls the whispers has the closest seat to the world's heart; so rises Hasan Sabbah and the Hashashin Order. Driven away from the palaces and blessed with arcane means to execute his plan, Hasan Sabbah aims to play the forces of the Silk Road against one another. A game of chess is being played, and a loss of a piece in this game means the loss of hundreds of lives or worse - the loss of hope against tyranny.