Aora

Aora is a subtropical archipelago nation situated off the eastern coast of Petrosa. It is made up of almost 2000 islands and is the second largest archipelago in the world by island count.

Aora began as an exclave of the Solan Territory, but eventually sought and claimed independence due to marked cultural, theological and ideological differences. Its patron deity is Laveda, the Goddess of Ships, which it shares with the neighbouring Cedan. Its islands are part of the same island group as those of Niro, a neighbouring archipelago nation, and both are in tense disputes over the ownership of numerous border islands.

The main language spoken in Aora is Solan; Aora remains one of the only two countries in the world (the other being Oro) that mainly speak Solan.

Cities

 * Cisa Aorina, the largest and the capital
 * Linuka
 * Nitajo
 * Nainasina
 * Hakina
 * Kajo
 * Erina

Age of Movement
During the Age of Movement, the land that would become Aora was occupied by the Sola tribe. Around 2000 BOG, a group of Solan tribespeople sailed off the east coast and discovered a group of uninhabited islands historically known as Cisaral Aora (the Coral Islands), on which they established satellite towns of the Solan Territory. They coexisted uneasily with the native first settlers of Cisaral Aora, but both populations continued to persist and thrive.

Throughout the Tribal Settlement age, the people of the Aor islands interacted heavily with the neighbouring Cedan, with both sharing the patron deity Laveda. Inevitably, the culture of the Aoran Solans began to differentiate, and by 1200 BOG, it could be considered a completely separate culture. The patron deity was a major contributing factor in this cultural bifurcation.

Red Ring Peace
Due in part to the failure of the over-centralized governments created by the Red Ring Pact to keep the massive tribal territories in running order, a movement—retroactively named the Great Reformation—was sweeping tribes worldwide. Spurred by a growing native presence, various settlements were rejecting the tribal system in favour of other ruling systems, and some minor territories were claiming independence from their tribal masters and embracing self-governance.

The islanders—who had reclaimed the Lorico name and called the nation Aora and themselves Aoran—were voicing similar discontent with regards to the Solan Territory's poor governance of the island towns. They believed independent governance of the islands ought to be handed to them, in the name of the goddess Laveda.

War was fought over the sea between the Solan rulers and the Aoran revolutionaries. The Aoran people were severely outnumbered, but with the Goddess of Ships on their side and fortune ("the Fortune") at their beckoning, they managed to overpower the Solan fleets in several fortutious ocean battles. In 1184 BOG, Aora became the first nation-state to attain separation from the Sola tribe.

Wars with Niro
Niro, a conquering empire to the east of Aora, found their relentless conquest halted when they encountered the fleets of Aora in the year 110 AOG. Their patron deity Niro, a god of death and sacrifice, had subjugated lower deities across the region as the empire had expanded, but found Laveda--perhaps one of the most powerful goddesses in the world--unsurpassable.

At an uneasy impasse, the two nations decided to avert senseless war through a number of treaties, though even those were contentious, with the exact distribution of border islands disputed and none of the treaties truly ratified. Now, only a shared aversion to senseless bloodshed keeps the region in check, and tensions have been sparked on more than a few occasions.