Quiet Resistance to the Scarlet Bones: Order of the Serpent
The Order of the Serpent is less of a secret society, and more of a grassroots level of resistance to the notorious Scarlet Bones.
The Scarlet Bones Society and their leader are the “big bad.” So, naturally, a rival faction springs up to resist them. That’s the Order of the Serpent. But they’re not an organization looking to force Scarlet Bones tycoons out of bureaucratic positions and replace them with their own people.
Instead, the Order acts differently. It’s not open warfare, and the Order refuses to engage in such violence. Its members want to be left alone. That’s it. Nothing more.
Those involved with building a parallel system at Arcane Elemental Academy and the surrounding areas are Order members. From massive defense contractors like Ukko Sharpe to the average layman living a “working-class lifestyle.”
The Order of the Serpent values anarcho-capitalist principles
Order of the Serpent members were instrumental in turning the Aurora Village and the surrounding Northern Region into societies that value privacy, opacity, the private sector, and, to a degree, a sound currency.
They’re the reason any vestiges of government in the area went to the wayside, and that a society run on voluntary exchange and contracts sprang up. This caused organizations like the Scarlet Bones to secretly spearhead national smear campaigns against the Order and the Northern Region.
Once upon a time, before technology became more widespread, the masses living in Etharia saw the Northern Region as a “dystopian billionaire’s paradise ruling its masses.” A region with inhabitants fully subjected to predatory companies. Companies that overcharged for goods and services with their own issued currency.
The result? Etharians steered clear of the Northern Region and refused to associate with suspected Order of the Serpent members.
As for those who openly considered the Northern Region, or even refused to criticize it? They risked their livelihoods. I’m talking job loss, subjected to secret surveillance, and in extreme cases, arrest and imprisonment.
Cracks in the foundation made the Scarlet Bones resort to gaslighting
As technology boomed and thought diversity became more widespread, the Scarlet Bones tweaked their narrative. They secretly incentivized the media figures they already funded, and they put others on their payroll to support one cause: make the Northern Region look like an absolute hellscape.
They named Sharpe Defense, Ukko’s defense contracting company, a de facto government. The media accused Ukko of spreading mis-, dis-, and malinformation against the Etharian Government. It also claimed he propagated predatory narratives to those in the North and many in the South.
This is the brewing overall conflict in Arcane Elemental Academy. One pitting an elitist organization with money, influence, power, and a “good guy approach” against a grassroots one smeared as the “bad guy.”
You won’t meet these two factions in the first three chapters of The Arcane Prophecy. But you will meet the series’ protagonist, Yote Diamondback. A girl who will find herself stuck in the middle of this conflict.
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