>>29471643Well currently, my idea is actually pretty fantastical, but not in a "everyone is running around using a chuubanite katana" way. The crucial element is that the church and the military are one in the same. The church runs basically everything in the Holy Kingdom in an extreme form of theocratic despotism, and though the bulk of the citizens do not want to change it anyways due to their religious fanatacism, the truth is they could not if they wanted to. The church holds all the power -- the higher you rise in its ranks, the better the education you receive, the more chuubanite you take into your body through holy rituals, the more access you have to the secrets of the Holy Kingdom's magic, and so on. Your position in the church becomes directly correlated to your knowledge and strength. The bulk of the army is composed of completely regular citizens. These soldiers fight as would be expected of normal humans, and the army appears "normal," for lack of a better description. Their weapons and tactics aren't anything out of the ordinary. But you eventually get to a point where that isn't true.
I don't know if you were here when I went over the idea of Kindred higher up on the religious ladder having progressively stronger shapeshifting powers. Since the church is also the military, the higher up in the army's chain of command you go, the less human -- in both appearance and physical ability -- the fighters become. It's a very anime sort of dichotomy where guns are great right up until a guy with a sword is better, basically. The pope equivalent would be some kind of completely inhuman monstrosity like ?% in picrel. A recurring theme I've been trying to emphasize in the Holy Kingdom is the idea of a pleasing, gilded surface hiding the monstrous, the rotten and grotesque beneath. Thoughts? I'd like the opinions of the other kindred here too, if any of you are around at the moment.
